Bringing proof that interest is not haram
Question:
Whoever says it is allowed to deal with interest has the burden to provide the evidence.
Answer:
Before answering your question I need to make it more precise.
I am not aware of any scholars who have said 'interest' is halal. This is not my view either. The question is, whether all kinds of interest is haram, or only a specific kind of interest (usury) is haram.
Therefore I reword your question as follows:
"Whoever says it is allowed to deal with interest that is not usury has the burden to provide the evidence."
My answer:
No my dear friend. Please bear in mind that 'interest' is an English word. The Qur'an obviously was revealed in Arabic. The Qur'an has declared 'riba' to be haram. Whoever says riba that the Qur'an made haram is the same as every kind of interest today has the burden to provide evidence.
However since this is an educational website I do have it in my plan to write an article about this. It will take a while though as there are other writings that I need to finish first.
For now, please bear in mind that evidence has already been provided by many scholars of the early times as well as many contemporary scholars and researchers (e.g. Fazlur Rahman, Abdullah Saeed). One only needs to extend the scope of one's studies to see these evidences. I will refer to some of these works in my article. You may be interested to know that it was only later in the scholarship of Islam that the view that says all kinds of interest is haram, became popular. You may like to know that even at the time of the Ottoman empire interest rates of up to 15% were considered permissible and not riba.
I hope to write about these in detail, so please bear with me.
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Farhad Shafti
February 2018
Whoever says it is allowed to deal with interest has the burden to provide the evidence.
Answer:
Before answering your question I need to make it more precise.
I am not aware of any scholars who have said 'interest' is halal. This is not my view either. The question is, whether all kinds of interest is haram, or only a specific kind of interest (usury) is haram.
Therefore I reword your question as follows:
"Whoever says it is allowed to deal with interest that is not usury has the burden to provide the evidence."
My answer:
No my dear friend. Please bear in mind that 'interest' is an English word. The Qur'an obviously was revealed in Arabic. The Qur'an has declared 'riba' to be haram. Whoever says riba that the Qur'an made haram is the same as every kind of interest today has the burden to provide evidence.
However since this is an educational website I do have it in my plan to write an article about this. It will take a while though as there are other writings that I need to finish first.
For now, please bear in mind that evidence has already been provided by many scholars of the early times as well as many contemporary scholars and researchers (e.g. Fazlur Rahman, Abdullah Saeed). One only needs to extend the scope of one's studies to see these evidences. I will refer to some of these works in my article. You may be interested to know that it was only later in the scholarship of Islam that the view that says all kinds of interest is haram, became popular. You may like to know that even at the time of the Ottoman empire interest rates of up to 15% were considered permissible and not riba.
I hope to write about these in detail, so please bear with me.
--------
Farhad Shafti
February 2018
