Wisdom and Decisive Speech

Allah (swt) says: We made his kingdom strong, and gave him wisdom and sound judgement in speech and decision. Allah (swt) has given him a strong kingdom — and we said that this was the golden age of the children of Israel, the time of Dāwūd and Sulaymān (peace be upon them). That is when their kingdom reached its peak, and that is when it was the kingdom of tawḥīd, the Oneness of Allah (swt), and the kingdom of Islam. After that, the religion was changing, and the children of Israel were going down.

Allah (swt) gave him strength in his kingdom; his kingdom was strong. And Allah gave him wisdom and good judgement — wa faṣla al-khiṭāb: Allah gave him decisiveness. Being decisive is important for somebody in the position of Dāwūd (peace be upon him). Dāwūd was a king; he had to deal with enemies; he had to deal with internal problems; he had to deal with many difficult, conflicting situations. So decisiveness is important in such a situation; it is a quality needed for somebody in such a position. When you are dealing with militaries, and you are dealing with enemies, and you are dealing with huge nations around you and strong enemies, the issue of decisiveness is important.

And decisiveness is also needed in court. See, there are some places where you need decisiveness, and some places where it is not needed that much. In court it is also needed: you have to have decisive judgement. You cannot go back and forth; you cannot have one foot to the left and one foot to the right. You have to have a clear understanding of the situation, and then a clear judgement. And Allah (swt) gave Dāwūd decisiveness — faṣl al-khiṭāb. He had the ability to study the situation and take a final judgement and go ahead with it, and then not retreat and not hesitate.