True Wealth Is Richness of the Soul

Occasion: Transcription of a Fajr khatira delivered on 10 September 2025 Source: A transcription of a video khatira by Dr. Ahmed Abouseif — [Watch the original video on YouTube](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nrPZykcM1eQ)

A question about the limit of sufficiency

Someone speaks in a short video and says: once you have made a large sum of money, you do not find many changes in your life after that; you will have bought the latest car, you have the villa and this and that, so after that, if you were to gain as much again or many times more, it would not make a great difference. I hear this and I ask: where is the limit of sufficiency for people? Where is the point of being satisfied?

Richness is richness of the soul

The Prophet ﷺ said: «لَيْسَ الْغِنَى عَنْ كَثْرَةِ الْعَرَضِ» ("Richness is not an abundance of worldly goods")^[1]; richness is richness of the soul. People differ in this; some people look at the size of the car, and they differ in how they value things.

What matters is that you ask: what do I want, and what do I need? Those who are content with bare sufficiency, with what is in their hands, with what meets their needs, with what Allah arranges their affairs by, are free of need for anything. As for those who chase desire and what the self wants, they are never filled.

A life of bare sufficiency

The Prophet ﷺ points to the matter of a life of bare sufficiency (kafāf).^[2] What does a life of bare sufficiency mean? That you live within your own means. And at the very least, we can absorb the idea and pass it on to others.

I ask Allah, glorified and exalted, to bless us and you in our provision, our work and what is in our hands, O Allah, āmīn. And let us not forget to pray that Allah shelter our oppressed brothers everywhere, and that Allah, blessed and exalted, grant them peace, that He make us among those who work for His religion, and that He not disgrace us in our religion or in our worldly life, O Allah, āmīn. And our sincere prayer is for the victory of Islam and its people, the victory of the religion and its helpers, and the victory of the people of obedience wherever they are and wherever they settle, O Allah, āmīn.

--- ^[1]: Editor's documentation: The ḥadīth is in the Ṣaḥīḥs of al-Bukhārī and Muslim from Abū Hurayrah (may Allah be pleased with him) in the wording: «لَيْسَ الْغِنَى عَنْ كَثْرَةِ الْعَرَضِ، وَلَكِنَّ الْغِنَى غِنَى النَّفْسِ» ("Richness is not an abundance of worldly goods; rather, richness is richness of the soul"); the transcript here preserves only the opening of the wording. ^[2]: Editor's documentation: The speaker did not cite a specific wording. Among the ḥadīths on this meaning is what is in Ṣaḥīḥ Muslim from ʿAbdullāh ibn ʿAmr (may Allah be pleased with them both) that the Messenger of Allah ﷺ said: «قَدْ أَفْلَحَ مَنْ أَسْلَمَ، وَرُزِقَ كَفَافًا، وَقَنَّعَهُ اللَّهُ بِمَا آتَاهُ» ("He has succeeded who has embraced Islam, been provided with what is sufficient, and been made content by Allah with what He has given him").