or in the collection of ḥadith, or any branch of knowledge—especially when one has no real need for it—along with the hoarding of books and writings, and the multiplication, subdivision, and constant generation of legal questions. At bottom, takāthur is a person’s desire to possess more than someone else, and this is blameworthy except in whatever brings one nearer to Allah; in that field, competition is a rivalry in good works and a race toward them.

In Ṣaḥīḥ Muslim (1) it is narrated from ʿAbd Allāh ibn al-Shikhkhīr that he came upon the Prophet ﷺ while he was reciting, “Competition for increase distracts you” (1). The Prophet said, “The son of Adam says: ‘My wealth! My wealth!’ Yet do you own of your wealth anything other than what you have given in charity and thus sent ahead, what you have eaten and thereby consumed, or what you have worn and thereby worn out?”

A useful note
• Whoever gains no benefit from his eyesight will gain none from his hearing.
• A servant has a veil between himself and Allah and another veil between himself and people; whoever tears down the veil between himself and Allah, Allah will tear down the veil between him and people.
• The servant has a Lord he will meet and a house he will inhabit; he should therefore seek his Lord’s pleasure before that meeting and furnish his house before moving into it.
• Wasting time is worse than death, for wasting time cuts you off from Allah and the Hereafter, whereas death only cuts you off from the world and its people.
• All of worldly life from beginning to end is not worth the grief of a single hour—how then about the grief of an entire lifetime!
• What is loved today is followed by what is disliked tomorrow, and what is disliked today is followed