Chuck Feeney made a fortune selling duty-free goods at airports. Then, for decades, he gave it away in secret: about eight billion dollars to universities, hospitals and peace work, including in Ireland. He often insisted that his name be kept off the buildings. He lived in a rented flat, wore a cheap watch, and died in 2023 with almost nothing left (Atlantic Philanthropies).
Al-Karīm is the Most Generous, and also the Noble: in Arabic the word means both. The very first revelation of the Qur'an used it: “Read: And thy Lord is the Most Bounteous.” (96:3, Pickthall). Even the most generous givers we know reached a limit.
Start with what we know
Start with something we know. Then take away everything it needs. What is left is not a bigger version of us: it is the Name.
Episode 1
In us
Feeney's philosophy was ‘giving while living’: why wait until you die, he asked, when you can see the good it does? His foundation, Atlantic Philanthropies, closed in 2020 after spending everything (Atlantic Philanthropies). It may be the most complete act of generosity by any rich person in modern times. But even Feeney could only give what he had, and once he had given it, it was gone. He also needed lawyers, accountants and a whole foundation to give it well. Human generosity, even at its greatest, runs out and has to be managed.
Episode 2
In nature
Every few years, Britain's oak trees have a ‘mast year’. A single oak can drop tens of thousands of acorns, far more than it needs to grow a few saplings (Woodland Trust). Jays, squirrels, mice and deer feast for months. It looks like extravagant generosity. Scientists think it is a strategy: by producing more acorns than animals can eat, oaks make sure some survive. And in the years between, the trees produce very few. Nature's generosity is real abundance, but it is not chosen, and it has its lean years.
Episode 3
At our best
Between 1883 and 1929 the steel magnate Andrew Carnegie paid for more than 2,500 free public libraries around the world. Around 660 of them were in Britain and Ireland (Carnegie UK Trust). Many still stand, and millions of people learned to read in them. It is one of history's great gifts to ordinary people. Yet the fortune came partly from steelworkers on long shifts and low pay, and in 1892 a strike at his Homestead works ended in deaths. Towns had to promise to pay for the upkeep. Even our noblest gifts carry a cost someone else paid.
Episode 4
The Break
Imagine giving without the fortune that runs out, the lean years between mast years, the cost paid by others or the name above the door. Every generosity we know has limits, conditions or a hidden price. Al-Karīm gives without running short, without needing anything back, to people who do not deserve it. And He is noble in how He gives. “O man! What hath made thee careless concerning thy Lord, the Bountiful, Who created thee, then fashioned, then proportioned thee?” (Qur'an 82:6-7, Pickthall).
From the tradition: al-Ghazālī: al-Karīm is the One who, 'when He is able, pardons; when He promises, keeps it; when He gives, exceeds the utmost hope, and does not mind how much He gives or to whom'. Exodus 34:6 'abounding in kindness (rav ḥesed)'
Watch and listen
Films, documentaries and voices that reach towards this Name. Each links out to where you can watch it.
The Qur'an tells how Solomon (peace be upon him), king and prophet, heard of the Queen of Sheba and her people. He sent a letter inviting them to worship the One God. While she was on her way to visit him, Solomon asked his court: “Which of you can bring me her throne before they arrive?”
A powerful jinn offered to bring it before Solomon rose from his seat. But one “who had knowledge of the Book” said: “I will bring it to you before your glance returns to you.” And in an instant, there it was.
Solomon could have boasted. Instead, he said: “And when he saw it set in his presence, (Solomon) said: This is of the bounty of my Lord, that He may try me whether I give thanks or am ungrateful. Whosoever giveth thanks he only giveth thanks for (the good of) his own soul; and whosoever is ungrateful (is ungrateful only to his own soul's hurt).” (27:40, Pickthall).
The Queen came, and in the end she said: “It was said unto her: Enter the hall. And when she saw it she deemed it a pool and bared her legs. (Solomon) said: Lo! it is a hall, made smooth, of glass. She said: My Lord! Lo! I have wronged myself, and I surrender with Solomon unto Allah, the Lord of the Worlds.” (27:44, Pickthall).
Muslim teachers drew a lesson from Solomon's words. Every gift is a test of gratitude, not a measure of our worth. Al-Ghazālī described al-Karīm as the One who, when He has power, forgives, and when He promises, keeps it. When He gives, He goes beyond every hope, and does not care how much He gives or to whom.
What each faith says
Read:
Judaism
“The LORD, the LORD, God, merciful and gracious, long-suffering, and abundant in goodness and truth”
When God reveals His Name to Moses, He calls Himself rav ḥesed, ‘abundant in goodness’ or loving-kindness. Ḥesed is one of the most important words in the Hebrew Bible: generosity that goes beyond what is owed.
Jewish tradition teaches that the highest form of charity is giving in a way that helps someone stand on their own. Close behind is giving when neither side knows the other (Maimonides, Laws of Gifts to the Poor 10:7-14).
Many Jewish homes keep a tzedakah box for charity, and children often drop in a coin just before the Shabbat candles are lit on Friday evening.
Christianity
“He who didn't spare his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how would he not also with him freely give us all things?”
Christians speak of God's generosity above all as grace: a gift that cannot be earned. Paul argues that if God gave His own Son, He will surely give everything else.
Jesus told a parable of a landowner who paid workers who came at the last hour the same as those who worked all day. He answered their complaint: “Is your eye evil, because I am good?” (Matthew 20:15).
Every May since 1957, Christian Aid Week has sent church volunteers door to door across Britain with envelopes for gifts to some of the poorest communities in the world.
Islam
“Verily we have honoured the Children of Adam. We carry them on the land and the sea, and have made provision of good things for them, and have preferred them above many of those whom We created with a marked preferment.”
Al-Karīm appears in the Qur'an in the first revelation (96:3), in Solomon's words (27:40) and in 82:6, which asks what has made people careless of their Most Generous Lord. The root k-r-m means both generous and noble: generosity that is gracious in how it gives.
The Qur'an says God has honoured every child of Adam (17:70), using the same root: karramnā. Human dignity is itself a gift from al-Karīm.
Same and different
All three faiths describe God as overflowingly generous, and all three ask believers to give generously, quietly and without humiliating the receiver. Judaism's ḥesed, Christianity's grace and Islam's karam point in the same direction. They differ on what God's greatest gift is: the covenant and Torah, Christ, or guidance through the Qur'an. All three agree that every human being has a dignity that is itself a gift.
A moment to reflect
Who is the most generous person you know? What makes them that way?
Is it easier to give or to receive generosity?
What would ‘giving while living’ look like in your life, on whatever scale?
Watch
Forbes on Chuck Feeney, the billionaire who gave it all away: the ‘In us’ rung.
Birmingham Museums Trust on acorns and mast years: the ‘In nature’ rung.
Do it together
families / faith groupsAnonymous gift
Together, choose someone who could do with a lift and leave them a gift without saying who it is from. Read Maimonides' ladder of giving and Qur'an 2:271 (‘if you give secretly to the poor, it is better for you’).
schools / neighboursLibrary day
Visit a local library, especially one that began as a Carnegie library. Find out who paid for it and who uses it now. Talk about gifts that keep giving after the giver has gone.
faith groups / neighboursChristian Aid Week
In May, join a local church's Christian Aid Week collection, or hold a sale or a sponsored walk of your own for it. Read Matthew 20:1-16 beforehand and talk about generosity that does not measure who deserves it.
Beyond the Abrahamic family, other traditions reach for something like this. Each in its own words; we connect, never rank.
Sikh
O God, Thou art great and merciful; Thou art the faultless Cherisher.
Tilang, Guru Nanak · Guru Granth Sahib p. 721 · tr. M. A. Macauliffe, The Sikh Religion (1909), vol. 1. Guru Nanak's Persian here uses the same word, karim, that Macauliffe renders 'merciful'.
Episode 1
