Lesson 3 of 6 · Kazm al ghayz is not silence
What the verse actually pairs restraint with
Here is the verse that gets quoted at angry people, and the one that sits alongside it.
Read 3:134 to the end rather than stopping at the first clause. It does not say restrain and then nothing. It puts restraining together with pardoning people and with doing good, as one sequence, and the people it is describing are people who spend, in ease and in hardship. That is a description of somebody doing things, not of somebody standing there saying nothing.
The verb is kazama, to hold or to swallow down. Whether holding it entails silence in a given situation is a question for a scholar and there is a real discussion behind it. What the verse plainly does not do is stop at the holding.
Qur’an and Sunnah
Read this to the end rather than stopping at the first clause. It does not say restrain and then nothing. It puts restraining together with pardoning people and with doing good, as one sequence, describing people who spend in ease and in hardship. Whether holding it entails silence in a given situation is a question for a scholar.
ٱلَّذِينَ يُنفِقُونَ فِي ٱلسَّرَّآءِ وَٱلضَّرَّآءِ وَٱلۡكَٰظِمِينَ ٱلۡغَيۡظَ وَٱلۡعَافِينَ عَنِ ٱلنَّاسِۗ وَٱللَّهُ يُحِبُّ ٱلۡمُحۡسِنِينَ
who give, both in prosperity and adversity, who restrain their anger and pardon people- God loves those who do good
Qur’an 3:134
The verse alongside it, and it pairs the same way. Forgiving is what follows the anger here rather than silence.
وَٱلَّذِينَ يَجۡتَنِبُونَ كَبَٰٓئِرَ ٱلۡإِثۡمِ وَٱلۡفَوَٰحِشَ وَإِذَا مَا غَضِبُواْ هُمۡ يَغۡفِرُونَ
who shun great sins and gross indecencies; who forgive when they are angry
Qur’an 42:37
Translation: M.A.S. Abdel Haleem, The Qur'an, Oxford University Press, 2004.