- English translation
Adding to a charitable endowment is a deed that brings reward.
- Literal wording
The increase in the endowment is ḥalāl.
- Meaning and lesson
The saying holds that anyone who has already set up a charitable endowment and later enlarges it is performing a further righteous act. The word usually meaning 'permitted' here signals a meritorious deed earning divine reward, so reading it as merely 'lawful' understates the point.
The reasoning rests on the purpose of a waqf, property set aside for charitable and religious ends: since what it yields is devoted to good causes, enlarging it extends that good, so the addition itself counts as another meritorious act.
- When it is used
Suited to praising or encouraging someone who adds to a charitable endowment they have already established, presenting the additional contribution as a further deed that earns reward.
Cite or copy proverb
How this record reached us: Editorially sourced.
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