No Soul Dies until Its Rizq Is Spent

This, then, is a major problem amongst Muslims today, and something that a Muslim ought really to instil in his or her heart from a younger age: rizq is in the hands of Allah (swt), not anybody else's. A person's duty is to work, and whatever that person's rizq is, it is going to come; and the duty is to seek it only through lawful means, never through unlawful ones. Seeking rizq through unlawful means is absolutely ḥarām. Absolutely ḥarām.

There is a hadith, found in Jāmiʿ al-Ṣaghīr, in which the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) says that Rūḥ al-Qudus, Jibrīl (peace be upon him), conveyed into his heart, inspired into his heart, and told him through revelation, that there is not a single soul, of any of the species amongst human beings or amongst the rest of Allah's (swt) creation, that shall die until it has completely finished, completely depleted, every last portion of its allotted rizq. For this reason, the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) says: fear Allah (swt); do not resort to unlawful ways of seeking rizq, to fraudulent ways of seeking rizq. Be dignified. Do not rush. Do not be khafīf about it, hasty and careless; there is no place in the heart for that kind of worry, since Allah (swt) alone is the provider.

Sometimes a person is seeking rizq entirely through lawful means, one hundred per cent, and yet feels that it is still not coming. The Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) explains that Allah (swt) sometimes withholds the rizq of a Muslim for a short period of time, on account of wrongdoing, of sins, that person has committed. A Muslim who cannot see his own faults should therefore make istighfār constantly, on a regular basis, and increase the number of times he does so — astaghfirullāh, astaghfirullāh, astaghfirullāh, O my Lord, please forgive me, O Allah, please forgive me, I do not see my own mistakes, please, O my Lord, forgive me. Where istighfār is increased, Allah (swt) releases that withheld rizq; but in every case, no one ever leaves this earth without first completely depleting the rizq allotted to them. Rizq is therefore to be sought from good, beautiful ways; and where Allah (swt) should happen to withhold that rizq for some reason or another, this must never lead a person to seek it through unlawful means instead, because rizq, in all its forms, is in the hands of Allah (swt), and can only be reached through ṭāʿah, obedience to Allah (swt), never through maʿṣiyah, disobedience to Him.