Someone ignorant of the verse’s meaning imagines that what was spent secretly and openly was different from what was spent by night and by day, and therefore says: “It was revealed concerning someone who spent four dirhams, whether Alī or someone else.” Hence He said:

“Those who spend their wealth by night and by day, secretly and openly.”

He did not introduce the latter phrase with the conjunction “and,” so as to say, “and secretly and openly.” Rather, these latter two modes fall within spending by night and by day, whether (1) the two expressions are parsed as accusative verbal nouns, since they denote two modes of spending, or as circumstantial qualifiers. Thus, whether the construction is understood as “secretly and openly” (2) or “while keeping it secret and making it public,” it becomes clear that the person who dismissed this as false was ignorant of what the Quran signifies. Nor is ignorance among the Rāfidah anything unusual.

Fifth: Even if we were to grant that Alī did this and that the verse was revealed concerning him, what would this amount to beyond spending (3) four dirhams under four different circumstances?! This is an act whose door remains open (4) and which will be easy to perform until the Day of Resurrection. Those who do this and many times more are too numerous to count. Indeed, anyone possessing any goodness will inevitably spend—Allah willing—sometimes by night and sometimes by day, sometimes in secret and sometimes openly. This is therefore not an exclusive distinction and does not establish any special merit with respect to the imamate (5).

[Section: The Twenty-Eighth Proof—“There is no verse in the Quran except that Alī stands at its head and is its leader...” —and the response to it]

Section

The Rāfidī said (6): “The twenty-eighth proof is the report narrated by Ahmad ibn