When The Powerful Eat Full And The Poor Go Hungry

When the powerful feast while the poor go hungry, Muslims are called to lead with both mercy and moral courage—feeding the needy, confronting injustice, and restoring balance to a society that has lost its conscience.

When I hear Muslim candidates make promises like “freeze rent,” “build affordable housing,” “free public transit,” “raise the minimum wage,” or “expand childcare,” I understand the intention. These are calls for relief and mercy. At the same time, I also understand why many people hesitate to support such measures.

From conversations with Muslims who fall into this line of thinking, I have heard people express fear of ballooning government budgets, taxpayer strain, and an ever-expanding state that replaces family and community with bureaucracy. Yet, I think the real tragedy is that neither side of this political divide (liberal or conservative) is grappling with the entirety of the situation fairly. On one hand, some speak of compassion without accountability, and on the other, they demand responsibility without mercy. The result is a nation swinging between extremes of a heartless pursuit of efficiency and a naive promise of endless aid.

Between Mercy and Responsibility

As Muslims who are to set a precedent and example for the societies we find ourselves in, one thing is absolutely clear. No matter what the political pressures are, and perhaps even our desire to remain pragmatic, we cannot be indifferent to suffering. When federal programs like food stamps (SNAP) risk disruption, threatening millions of vulnerable and innocent seniors, children, and families with hunger, we have a duty to care.

Moreover, we cannot just demand action from others; we ourselves must also be willing to act. The Qur’an praises those “who give food, in spite of love for it, to the needy, the orphan, and the captive,” [Surah Al-Insan; 76:8] saying:

“We feed you only for the countenance of Allah; we wish not from you reward or gratitude.’” [Surah Al-Insan; 76:9]

Americans in line for food aid.

Demonstrating (and I use this verb on purpose) mercy is not just about good politics, like many Americans have come to see it; it’s about recognizing real pain and responding to it instead of waiting for some perfect economic system. If a family can rest easier because they can afford groceries this month through expanded credits, that relief is a mercy worth supporting.

The Prophet said, “He is not a believer whose stomach is filled while his neighbor goes hungry.”^[2]

All this being said, I know that mercy also demands honesty. Many of these short-term political promises and vehemently argued solutions are indeed bandages on deeper wounds. The question that Muslims must provide moral leadership on, however, is not only how to help families survive today but to make demands and attempts to answer why they are drowning in the first place. Should it take two incomes just to afford rent? Why has inflation turned basic food into a luxury? As the national debt swells, why are billions of dollars flowing abroad in aid packages that most citizens don’t understand? Why does our government keep printing money as if wealth can appear without real economic activity?

The Root of the Crisis: A System Built on Riba

At the root of all this is a moral distortion that the Qur’an names explicitly: Riba. Also defined as excessive interest or usury. The Qur’an declares,

“Those who consume riba will not stand [on the Day of Judgment] except as one stands who is being beaten by Satan into insanity.” It then warns, “If you do not desist, then be informed of war from Allah and His Messenger.”^[3] For those educated in economics, they might have a better understanding than the average person of how an economy built on debt becomes an economy at war with its own conscience, as we are seeing today. Riba turns money into a self-replicating creature that feeds on itself rather than serving human needs.

In the Islamic worldview, wealth is not evil, but it is also never absolute. The Qur’an commands that economic systems be designed “so that wealth does not merely circulate among the rich of you.”^[4] That single phrase dismantles both capitalist hoarding and socialist dependency. It implies movement where resources flow instead of the normalization of wealth that pools upward, insulated by tax loopholes and corporate immunity, while ordinary families bear the weight of inflation and debt.

In light of the conversation around food stamps at risk, the Qur’an condemns “those who, when they take by measure from people, take in full, but when they give by measure or weight to them, they cause loss.”^[5] These verses expose a timeless hypocrisy whereby leaders ensure their own salaries, pensions, and benefits while freezing food assistance for families who depend on it to survive. They take their measure in full (their comforts, healthcare, privileges), yet when it comes time to measure out sustenance to the vulnerable, they shrink the scale.

Beyond Relief

This is where Muslims must elevate the conversation beyond just secular, unfair policymaking and call it for what it is, which is moral fraud. The Qur’an warns again:

“And O my people, give full measure and weight in justice and do not deprive the people of their due and do not commit abuse on the earth, spreading corruption.” [Surah Hud; 11:85]^[6] 

To defraud is not only to cheat in trade and business; it is also just as much about withholding what is due and betraying the trust of leadership. When those entrusted with public resources exploit power or abandon the poor under the guise of fiscal prudence, they commit fasad (corruption) in its truest sense.

In Islam, there is no entity nor individual that is beyond moral responsibility, unlike the American political and legal structures, which include mechanisms such as presidential immunity that can shield leaders from full accountability. That is why the khalifah Umar ibn Abd al-Aziz stands as one of history’s rare examples of moral political leadership when he curbed official excess, prohibited state officials from personal enrichment, and redirected wealth to those in need.^[7] Umar ibn al-Khattab’s establishment of the Bayt al-Mal (public treasury) embodied this same principle, where he ensured that every citizen received food and a stipend.^[8]

A Need for Preparation and Reform

Today, we need to revive that spirit. Muslims in America must prepare for both immediate and long-term responses. In the short term, we must fund and connect community food banks, revive mutual-aid efforts, and strengthen zakat institutions. During crises like potential SNAP disruptions, we cannot wait for Congress to act, because as individuals, we have a responsibility to use our own resources to act ourselves.

Muslims in Detroit pack boxes of food aid.

During the pandemic, many youth in our community created an initiative to check in on vulnerable neighbors, ensuring they had access to groceries, food, and basic necessities. We should be ready to revive that same spirit of compassion and initiative whenever the need arises again.

On top of bringing immediate relief, in the long term, our discourse must mature. Saying that we cannot be content with endless relief programs that merely manage misery is not the same as saying that these efforts should ever cease. Rather, our aim should be expanded to simultaneously reform the structures that produce it in the first place. From systems driven by Riba and speculation all the way to corporate impunity.

Supporting short-term relief does not make us naive, but ignoring long-term reform does make us complicit. I believe this is the dichotomy Muslim-Americans must break, and indeed, we need to introduce nuance to the public discourse in order to actually effect change in our milieu. If we can revive this balance of compassion that acts and honesty that reforms, we may yet model for America what a truly moral economy looks like.

From Critique to Action

In moments of crisis, moral response requires both organization and imagination. Here are ways Muslims can respond:

1. Partner with local faith and civic groups.
   

Churches, temples, and interfaith coalitions often host food banks or meal programs. We should actively collaborate to ensure Muslim families, who generally underuse public social services due to stigma or inaccessibility, are reached.

2. Work with local jurisdictions.
   

City and county governments have relief grants or emergency food distribution funds. Muslim organizations can apply for these or partner with agencies to reach underserved Muslim populations more directly. Part of proactively getting into local governments’ radar is ensuring good outreach and networking so that communities are able to actually offer their masjid as pop-up distribution hubs for wider city food relief programs.

3. Leverage technology platforms that can bring benefit!

I personally have been inspired by the acts of kindness that apps like NextDoor have facilitated in the last few years. Neighborhood apps connect those in a local community like never before and provide us the opportunity to offer our services to those who live near us and are in need. It’s an active facilitator to help us actualize the hadith about not going to sleep if we know that our neighbors are hungry.  

4. The Sunnah of Ukhuwwah.

The life of the Prophet demonstrates the reality of true brotherhood, sisterhood, and community. During times of prolonged crisis, the Muslim community has a tried and tested method for ensuring families are supported through the pairing up of the well off with the less well off. We have the tools and ability to pair families during a crisis, and many are willing to step up. Moreover, non-Muslim grocery stores always have a program where buyers can purchase a bag of groceries for a family in need, and this should be replicated for halal stores as well.

5. Leverage business owners.

I’ve been to many Muslim-owned restaurants that will pack up food at the end of the day to take to homeless shelters, and I am hopeful that this is a common practice among most restaurants, Muslim or otherwise. With some coordination, it shouldn’t be too difficult to prioritize halal meals for Muslim families and leave the non-halal foods for non Muslim families and homeless shelters.

Conclusion

Dallas masjid feeds the hungry during a “Day of Dignity.”

It is true that many of the proposals touted in modern politics, from endless subsidies, government expansion, and reliance on state relief, can create unhealthy dependence, weaken families, and bankrupt nations. History has proven that a purely socialist model collapses under the weight of its own promises. As Muslim-Americans, we cannot be naïve to that reality.

There is, however, an equal and opposite truth! The working class did not create the economic disaster we are living in; the powerful did. It was not working-class families who engineered a riba-driven financial system, inflated the currency, shipped jobs overseas, or allowed corporations to grow fat at the expense of people’s livelihoods and quality of life diminishing. It was not single mothers or grocery clerks who ballooned the national debt to trillions, speculated on Wall Street casinos, or carved tax loopholes wide enough to swallow entire communities.

To look at the hungry today, those people trapped in a crisis they did not create, and say that they don’t deserve government support in the meantime, is moral blindness. Muslims were not placed in this land to parrot slogans from either political wing. So, although we recognize that perpetual welfare is not a vision for human dignity, refusing to feed the hungry while elites gorge themselves is cruelty disguised as prudence.

When the powerful eat full and the poor go hungry, the response of a believer ought to be moral intervention at every level.

Related:

Faith In Action: Zakat, Sadaqah, And Islam’s Role In Embracing Humanitarianism In A Globalized World

On Social Justice and being “Prophetic”

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