Do Not Make Your Hand Tied — The Young Man Who Asked for Charity

Verse: "And do not make your hand tied to your neck nor extend it completely and then sit blamed and regretful." (Al-Isra 29)

Context:

• Commentators narrate: a man — in some reports a young man — came to the Prophet (peace be upon him) asking for money for equipment or a necessity. The Prophet had nothing and apologized
• The verse was revealed teaching balance in spending: neither blameworthy miserliness nor destructive excess
• "Tied to your neck" is a metaphor for extreme miserliness — a bound hand that gives nothing
• "Extend it completely" is a metaphor for prodigality — spending without reckoning until nothing remains
• "And sit blamed and regretful" — blamed for the waste, regretful and exhausted by what was spent

Lesson:
Moderation in wealth is a Quranic virtue — the generous person is not one who gives everything they have, but one who gives according to their means while keeping what suffices them.