denote someone to whom this is done. The same distinction occurs in analogous pairs such as duhkah (someone laughed at) and duhakah (someone who laughs often), and lu‘bah (someone played with) and lu‘abah (someone who plays often).] (*)
His words:
“Who amasses wealth and repeatedly counts it.”
He describes him as attacking people and finding fault with them, and as amassing wealth and repeatedly counting it. This parallels His words in Surah al-Hadīd:
“Allah does not love anyone who is conceited and boastful.”
“Those who are miserly.”
There is a passage with a similar meaning in Surah al-Nisā’. The slanderer and backbiter resembles the conceited boaster, while the one who amasses wealth and keeps counting it resembles the miser.
Another parallel to these two traits is His saying:
“A slanderer, going about spreading malicious gossip.”
“Withholding good, a transgressor, sinful.”
“Harsh and, moreover, ignoble.”
He describes him as arrogant and miserly. Likewise, He says:
“But as for the one who is miserly and considers himself self-sufficient.”
These are five passages. Such conduct springs from the love of status and wealth: love of status drives a person to belittle others through slander, backbiting, boasting and conceit, while love of wealth drives him to miserliness. His opposite is someone who gives rather than being miserly, and fears Allah rather than slandering or backbiting.
Furthermore, the giver benefits people, while the person who fears Allah does not harm them: he thus brings benefit without causing harm. By contrast, the conceited, boastful miser deprives them of good through his miserliness and inflicts harm upon them through his boasting. He therefore harms them without benefiting them. The same applies to “the slanderer who amasses wealth.” Another example is Qārūn, who amassed wealth and belonged to the people of Moses, yet oppressed them.
Whoever reflects upon the Quran will find that its passages explain one another. For, as Ibn ‘Abbās said in the report transmitted by al-Wālibī, it encompasses categories and parables. This explains the description: “mutually consistent and oft-repeated.”