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Surah Al-Baqarah — 2:273

لِلْفُقَرَآءِ ٱلَّذِينَ أُحْصِرُوا۟ فِى سَبِيلِ ٱللَّهِ لَا يَسْتَطِيعُونَ ضَرْبًا فِى ٱلْأَرْضِ يَحْسَبُهُمُ ٱلْجَاهِلُ أَغْنِيَآءَ مِنَ ٱلتَّعَفُّفِ تَعْرِفُهُم بِسِيمَـٰهُمْ لَا يَسْـَٔلُونَ ٱلنَّاسَ إِلْحَافًا ۗ وَمَا تُنفِقُوا۟ مِنْ خَيْرٍ فَإِنَّ ٱللَّهَ بِهِۦ عَلِيمٌ

Lilfuqaraaa'il lazeena uhsiroo fee sabeelil laahi laa yastatee'oona darban fil ardi yah sabuhumul jaahilu aghniyaaa'a minat ta'affufi ta'rifuhum biseemaahum laa yas'aloonan naasa ilhaafaa; wa maa tunfiqoo min khairin fa innal laaha bihee 'Aleem

Give to the poor who are constrained in the path of God, unable to travel through the land. The unaware would think them well-off because of their restraint, but you know them by their mark: they do not press people with their asking. And whatever good you spend, God knows it.

Reflection

Identifying who is meant falls on the giver, and the ordinary signs are said to fail: restraint makes poverty look like sufficiency. What put these people in need was being cut off from movement, and the same Arabic idiom for going out into the land is used at 73:20 of those away seeking God's bounty. The tradition reads the closing clause two ways, that they never ask at all or that they ask without clinging.

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