the disappearance of the pain he felt within himself. Yet that pain subsides only through action on his part. This brings relief; at its most severe, his condition resembles that of a sick person treated with something that soothes his pain while the illness remains. His hatred of Allah’s blessing upon His servant is itself a disease, for that blessing may return to the envied person, and he may receive something greater still. A similar blessing may also be granted to someone like the person he envies. The envious person is not concerned with any particular thing; rather, he resents the blessings bestowed upon people of that kind.

This is why some have defined envy as wishing for a blessing to disappear: whoever resents another person’s blessing wishes in his heart for its disappearance.

The second kind is to resent another person’s superiority over oneself and therefore wish to be his equal or better than him. This too is envy, though it is what they have called emulation. The Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, called it envy in the hadith reported by both al-Bukhārī and Muslim from Ibn Masʿūd and Ibn ʿUmar, may Allah be pleased with them both. He said:

“There is no envy except in two cases: a man whom Allah has granted wisdom, by which he judges and which he teaches; and a man whom Allah has granted wealth and enabled to expend it in the cause of truth.”

This is Ibn Masʿūd’s wording. Ibn ʿUmar’s wording is:

“A man whom Allah has granted the Quran, who stands in prayer reciting it at various hours of the night and day; and a man whom Allah has granted wealth, who spends from it in the cause of truth at various hours of the night and day.”

Al-Bukhārī also narrated it from Abū Hurayra, with the wording:

“There is no envy except in two cases: a man whom Allah has granted the Quran, who recites it night and day. Another man hears him and says, ‘If only I had been given the like of what this man has been given