Appearance
The Meaning of Unlimited Sustenance
God provides sustenance to whomever He wishes without means and ordinary calculations: “Indeed God provides whomever He wishes without any reckoning”, although in providing sustenance through ordinary means, God alone is still the Provider: “Indeed it is God who is the All-provider, Powerful, All-strong”.(79) The word “it is” (huwa) and the definite article (al) in “the All-provider” (al-Razzāq) indicate exclusivity; meaning He alone is the Provider, whether through ordinary means and calculations or without calculation and supernatural means. Of course, if it is supernatural, humans more quickly perceive the unseen, and in the verse under discussion He said: “Indeed God provides whomever He wishes without any reckoning.”
Sustenance also encompasses both material and spiritual provisions, as Imam al-Ṣādiq (a.s.) explained regarding “food” in the verse “So let man observe his food”,(80) applying it to spiritual sustenance, saying: “His knowledge and from whom he takes it”.(81)
Note:
Sustenance is sometimes ordinary and sometimes extraordinary; like seasonal fruit appearing in another season, since seasonal fruit in its own season is considered ordinary sustenance.
Sustenance is sometimes material and sometimes spiritual; like knowledge and other spiritual virtues.
Tangible sustenance is sometimes natural and sometimes supernatural; like heavenly food.
The delivery of natural sustenance is sometimes ordinary and sometimes extraordinary, just as the delivery of spiritual sustenance like knowledge is sometimes ordinary, obtained through study and discussion, and sometimes extraordinary, received through dreams or sleep-like states and similar means. All these matters and similar ones fall under God’s calculated and “without reckoning” sustenance.