He also said:

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The words of Allah Most High in Sūrat al-Nisā’:

“Indeed, Allah does not love those who are arrogant and boastful—those who are miserly and urge others to be miserly.”

And in Sūrat al-Hadīd:

“He does not love anyone arrogant and boastful—those who are miserly and urge others to be miserly.”

These passages have been interpreted as referring to miserliness with wealth and withholding it, and to withholding knowledge and the like. They encompass withholding anything beneficial in religious or worldly affairs, whether knowledge, wealth, or anything else. Likewise, His words:

“And spend out of what We have provided for them,”

have been interpreted as encompassing giving both wealth and knowledge.

Muʿādh said concerning knowledge:

“For someone who does not know it, learning it is charity.”

Abū al-Dardā’ said:

“No man gives any charity better than an exhortation he delivers to a gathering, whose members then disperse having benefited from it through Allah”—or words to that effect.

A report states:

“What an excellent gift and an excellent present is a piece of news that a man hears and then offers as a gift to a brother of his”—or words to that effect.

This is the charity of the prophets and their heirs, the scholars. That is why Allah bestows blessings upon those who teach people what is good, and His angels, the fish in the sea, and the birds in the sky pray for them, just as