al-Ḥadīd

مَن ذَا الَّذِي يُقْرِضُ اللَّهَ قَرْضًا حَسَنًا فَيُضَاعِفَهُ لَهُ وَلَهُ أَجْرٌ كَرِيمٌ

11. Who is he that will lend Allah a goodly loan? Then Allah will increase it manifold to his credit and he will have a good reward.

In order to encourage believers to expend in Allah's Cause, the blessed Verse makes use of another interesting expression saying:

"Who is he that will lend Allah a goodly loan? Then Allah will increase it manifold to his credit and he will have a good reward."

It is a surprising expression since God Almighty Who bestows all Bounties and all the atoms of our being are emanated every single moment from His boundless ocean of Emanation and they are all possessed by Him regards us as the owners of possessions and asks us to give Him a goodly loan such that He will increase it manifold, hundreds or even thousands times more. Furthermore, such great rewards may not be bestowed by others besides Him. The Arabic word qardh denotes cutting and portioning a part of possession. miqradh denotes scissors and qiradha is applied to apportioned possession. Giving loans to God Almighty shall be increased manifold on the Day of Resurrection.

The word is accompanied by hasan:

("goodly")

connoting that it shall be reimbursed immediately without any trouble. The blessings arising from such goodly loans include decrease in enmity and increase in love, safeguarding people's prestige and impeding their bankruptcy, betterment of the economic structure of society, impeding the prevalence of usury, checking avarice and miserliness, just distribution of wealth, and growth in the culture of cooperation. According to a tradition narrated from Imam Kadim (as), the blessed Verse in question reflects contributions made to the Lord of the Age [namely, the Twelfth Imam (as)].¹⁴

Footnotes

1. 14. Tafsir Safi, p. 522, under the blessed Verse in question.