By Amir Aliyudin
The primacy of charity in Islam apparently has extraordinary benefits in the world and in the hereafter. There are a lot of merits for those who love charity, according to the Prophet Muhammad.
What is the primacy of charity in Islam? Many people even among those are able, but not willing to give alms when he knows there are many people out there who are less capable. There are many good qualities promised by Allah for those who love to give alms. People like this will be glorified by God, and they will reap the rewards outstanding from Allah SWT.
Alms turned out to have great virtues. There are many arguments we can find, powers and the luck of the Muslims who never missed a charity. By knowing the virtues, we can become more conscious to donate anywhere.
There are some virtues of giving charity or alms, the firs virtue is fold rewards, like Allah said in the Quran:
“Those who give alms, both men and women, and lend to Allah a goodly loan, it shall be multiplied (rewards) to them; and for their reward.”(QS. Al Hadid: 18).
Not only that, for further example, I have a lot of experience in giving charity. The moment I gave the charity, after a while Allah gives more than what I have given in return. This shows that when we do charity Allah will see it and He will reward us immediately in this world and surely in the hereafter.
The second virtue is that patronage in the hereafter. Those who give alms will not be afraid of those who do evil to him, because God will always provide shelter and shade, even during the final days later. Prophet describes the seven types of people who get shade in the final days of the day in which there will be no other shade that can be obtained only from Allah. One type of such practices is a man who likes to charity, and does not Rya.
On the other hand, when people do charity for Rya (make sensation only or hoping other to see it only without for the seeking of Allah wills) that people become losers. Moreover, Allah will not give rewards toward them, because Rya is damaging our Amals.
The last virtue is “Removing our Sins”, there is a hadith saying this:
“Charity can remove sin as water extinguishes fire.” (HR. Tirmidhi, authenticated in Saheeh Al Albanian At Tirmidhi, 614)
According to the Hadith, Islamic virtues of this charity is a sin can be removed by charity, as the fire could be extinguished by water. But certainly not the only charity itself can then remove sin, but charity that is also accompanied by repentance, only then really got his pardon. There are things that are not allowed, that is, people who knowingly planned bad things (cheating, stealing, robbing, usury, corruption, and take the property of orphans) and prior to doing the things that he had intended to give alms for the sake of remove those sins. Such people actually know if he is doing is wrong, but arbitrarily; hence, it is considered a great sin.
Thus, how the charity is beneficial toward us and Islam itself ask Muslims to do charity due to the virtues above. It is not the matter of how much we gave but it is a matter of what we can give. And may we always be with those who are pious. Amiiin.***