Why Paying Interest is Not Haram (follow up 2)?
Question:
Although I can understand your end argument, I disagree with it. Most things are rooted in Riba but we our selves are not paying Riba directly I.e Internet users. Therefore to compare a person who actively seeks to make purchases fully aware of his commitment towards paying Riba is very different from a person who uses internet.
More importantly, I strongly disagree with your initial point. Those who pay Riba are often those who intend to buy house often to generate more income I.e buy then let. Or they buy a house because mortgage is cheaper than rent. In your argument you portray the payee as helpless and only out of necessity are they paying Riba. This is not true for most 90% of people.
I hope you don't take what I'm about to say now as an offence if you are genuine and truly believe in what you say. I honestly believe those (scholars, imams ect) who say Riba is okay are doing it either for financial gain or popularity. The destruction that Riba does is easy to see and yet layman indulge in it, and the fake or genuinely misguided leaders support it.
Answer:
I really like to address the third point in your post, as compared to that, the other issues are trivial. So I will very briefly address your first and the second point:
- In your first post you wrote 'Paying RIBA is Facilitating as your making the system stay alive'.
You are referring to ‘system’. In Business Management (which is my other area of work) it is a well known fact that the whole supply network is one system. Interest flows within this system as a whole. Engaging when any part of this system can be seen as contribution to the system and all its elements, including interest. If as you wrote, paying interest contributes to making the system alive, then it only follows that paying to a company that is engaged in interest also contributes to making the system alive. You may like to know that there are in deed people who avoid using any banks, utilities, etc. to avoid this system.
- As for your point about being helpless, I think you misunderstood me. This is what I wrote:
'The person who pays riba does that out of being helpless, he never wishes the riba system to continue.'
What I mean by 'helpless' here is that if the person had an option to get the same benefit but without paying riba then he/she would have done that. This person therefore is merely a User not a facilitator. A facilitator is one who wishes the riba system to continue because he/she is gaining from it. To say the riba system is replaced with riba free system is a good news for the User of riba but a bad news for the facilitator of riba. I hope you now see my point.
I again emphasise, I am answering your questions based on your assumption that any interest is riba. As I wrote, I only consider Usury to be riba and do not consider regulated interest of bank or financial institutions to be riba. Nevertheless even in the case of usury I do hold that it is receiving of usury that is haram and not paying it.
- This then brings me to your third point, which is the main point I wanted to address in your post. You wrote:
'I hope you don't take what I'm about to say now as an offence if you are genuine and truly believe in what you say. I honestly believe those (scholars, imams ect) who say Riba is okay are doing it either for financial gain or popularity.'
I am amazed that you write this and then hope that I do not take an offence. I do take an offence, not on a personal level, but because you are accusing a number of creditable scholars of Islam (from the very early times till now) as dishonest people.
How many of these scholars do you know personally which makes you write this statement? How many of them you actually have met and from those who passed away long before the century in which you were born, which ones' lives have you studied? Do you know how many pious and knowledgeable scholars of Islam are you accusing with this statement? In fact, do you even know the name of all the scholars that you are accusing? You do not even appear to be slightly cautious and at least use an expression like ‘some of them’, although even then you had made baseless accusations.
My dear brother. My advise is don’t worry about scholarly rulings on riba. Let every one follows what he/she considers to be correct. You write about what you refer to as destruction caused by riba. I assure you, destruction caused by the way of thinking that the above statement of yours presents has been and is much more damaging.
Don’t worry about riba brother, be worry about the implication of these verses:
وَ لا تَقْفُ ما لَيْسَ لَكَ بِهِ عِلْمٌ إِنَّ السَّمْعَ وَ الْبَصَرَ وَ الْفُؤادَ كُلُّ أُولئِكَ كانَ عَنْهُ مَسْؤُلاً
And never concern yourself with anything of which you have no knowledge: verily, hearing and sight and heart will be called to account for it (17:36)
يا أَيُّهَا الَّذينَ آمَنُوا اجْتَنِبُوا كَثيراً مِنَ الظَّنِ إِنَّ بَعْضَ الظَّنِ إِثْمٌ ...
O believers Avoid much suspicion. Indeed some suspicions are sin … (49:12)
Related Topics:
- Why Paying Interest Is Not Haram (follow up 1)?
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Farhad Shafti
December 2017
Although I can understand your end argument, I disagree with it. Most things are rooted in Riba but we our selves are not paying Riba directly I.e Internet users. Therefore to compare a person who actively seeks to make purchases fully aware of his commitment towards paying Riba is very different from a person who uses internet.
More importantly, I strongly disagree with your initial point. Those who pay Riba are often those who intend to buy house often to generate more income I.e buy then let. Or they buy a house because mortgage is cheaper than rent. In your argument you portray the payee as helpless and only out of necessity are they paying Riba. This is not true for most 90% of people.
I hope you don't take what I'm about to say now as an offence if you are genuine and truly believe in what you say. I honestly believe those (scholars, imams ect) who say Riba is okay are doing it either for financial gain or popularity. The destruction that Riba does is easy to see and yet layman indulge in it, and the fake or genuinely misguided leaders support it.
Answer:
I really like to address the third point in your post, as compared to that, the other issues are trivial. So I will very briefly address your first and the second point:
- In your first post you wrote 'Paying RIBA is Facilitating as your making the system stay alive'.
You are referring to ‘system’. In Business Management (which is my other area of work) it is a well known fact that the whole supply network is one system. Interest flows within this system as a whole. Engaging when any part of this system can be seen as contribution to the system and all its elements, including interest. If as you wrote, paying interest contributes to making the system alive, then it only follows that paying to a company that is engaged in interest also contributes to making the system alive. You may like to know that there are in deed people who avoid using any banks, utilities, etc. to avoid this system.
- As for your point about being helpless, I think you misunderstood me. This is what I wrote:
'The person who pays riba does that out of being helpless, he never wishes the riba system to continue.'
What I mean by 'helpless' here is that if the person had an option to get the same benefit but without paying riba then he/she would have done that. This person therefore is merely a User not a facilitator. A facilitator is one who wishes the riba system to continue because he/she is gaining from it. To say the riba system is replaced with riba free system is a good news for the User of riba but a bad news for the facilitator of riba. I hope you now see my point.
I again emphasise, I am answering your questions based on your assumption that any interest is riba. As I wrote, I only consider Usury to be riba and do not consider regulated interest of bank or financial institutions to be riba. Nevertheless even in the case of usury I do hold that it is receiving of usury that is haram and not paying it.
- This then brings me to your third point, which is the main point I wanted to address in your post. You wrote:
'I hope you don't take what I'm about to say now as an offence if you are genuine and truly believe in what you say. I honestly believe those (scholars, imams ect) who say Riba is okay are doing it either for financial gain or popularity.'
I am amazed that you write this and then hope that I do not take an offence. I do take an offence, not on a personal level, but because you are accusing a number of creditable scholars of Islam (from the very early times till now) as dishonest people.
How many of these scholars do you know personally which makes you write this statement? How many of them you actually have met and from those who passed away long before the century in which you were born, which ones' lives have you studied? Do you know how many pious and knowledgeable scholars of Islam are you accusing with this statement? In fact, do you even know the name of all the scholars that you are accusing? You do not even appear to be slightly cautious and at least use an expression like ‘some of them’, although even then you had made baseless accusations.
My dear brother. My advise is don’t worry about scholarly rulings on riba. Let every one follows what he/she considers to be correct. You write about what you refer to as destruction caused by riba. I assure you, destruction caused by the way of thinking that the above statement of yours presents has been and is much more damaging.
Don’t worry about riba brother, be worry about the implication of these verses:
وَ لا تَقْفُ ما لَيْسَ لَكَ بِهِ عِلْمٌ إِنَّ السَّمْعَ وَ الْبَصَرَ وَ الْفُؤادَ كُلُّ أُولئِكَ كانَ عَنْهُ مَسْؤُلاً
And never concern yourself with anything of which you have no knowledge: verily, hearing and sight and heart will be called to account for it (17:36)
يا أَيُّهَا الَّذينَ آمَنُوا اجْتَنِبُوا كَثيراً مِنَ الظَّنِ إِنَّ بَعْضَ الظَّنِ إِثْمٌ ...
O believers Avoid much suspicion. Indeed some suspicions are sin … (49:12)
Related Topics:
- Why Paying Interest Is Not Haram (follow up 1)?
--------
Farhad Shafti
December 2017
