By Abu Ameenah Bilal Philips
The Religion Of Islam
The first thing that one should know and clearly understand about Islam is what the word "Islam" itself means. The religion of Islam is not named after a person as in the case of Christianity which was named after Jesus Christ, Buddhism after Gotama Buddha, Confucianism after Confucius, and Marxism after Karl Marx. Nor was it named after a tribe like Judaism after the tribe of Judah and Hinduism after the Hindus. Islam is the true religion of "Allah" and as such, its name represents the central principle of Allah's "God's" religion; the total submission to the will of Allah "God". The Arabic word "Islam" means the submission or surrender of one's will to the only true god worthy of worship "Allah" and anyone who does so is termed a "Muslim", The word also implies "peace" which is the natural consequence of total submission to the will of Allah. Hence, it was not a new religion brought by Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) in Arabia in the seventh century, but only the true religion of Allah re-expressed in its final form.
Islam is the religion which was given to Adam, the first man and the first prophet of Allah, and it was the religion of all the prophets sent by Allah to mankind. The name of God's religion Islam was not decided upon by later generations of man. It was chosen by Allah Himself and clearly mentioned in His final revelation to man. In the final book of divine revelation, the Qur'aan, Allah states the following:
"This day have I perfected your religion for you, completed My favour upon you, and have chosen for you Islam as your religion". (Soorah Al-Maa'idah 5:3)
"If anyone desires a religion other than Islam (submission to Allah (God) never will It be accepted of Him" (Soorah Al'Imraan 3:85)
"Abraham was not a Jew nor Christian; but an upright Muslim." (Soorah Aal'imraan 3:67)
Nowhere in the Bible will you find Allah saying to Prophet Moses' people or their descendants that their religion is Judaism, nor to the followers of Christ that their religion is Christianity. In fact, Christ was not even his name, nor was it Jesus! The name "Christ" comes from the Greek word Christos which means the annointed. That is, Christ is a Greek translation of the Hebrew title "Messiah". The name "Jesus" on the other hand, is a latinized version of the Hebrew name Esau.
For simplicity's sake, I will however continue to refer to Prophet Esau (PBUH) as Jesus. As for his religion, it was what he called his followers to. Like the prophets before him, he called the people to surrender their will to the will of Allah; (which is Islam) and he warned them to stay away from the false gods of human imagination.
According to the New Testament, he taught his followers to pray as follows: "Yours will be done on earth as it is in Heaven".
19.7.09
The True Religion – Part 2
By Abu Ameenah Bilal Philips
The Message Of Islam
Since the total submission of one's will to Allah represents the essence of worship, the basic message of Allah's divine religion, Islam is the worship of Allah alone and the avoidance of worship directed to any person, place or thing other than Allah. Since everything other than Allah, the Creator of all things, is Allah's creation; it may be said that Islam, in essence calls man away from the worship of creation and invites him to worship only its Creator. He is the only one deserving man's worship as it is only by His will that prayers are answered. If man prays to a tree and his prayers are answered, it was not the tree which answered his prayers but Allah who allowed the circumstances prayed for to take place. One might say, "That is obvious," however, to tree-worshippers it might not be. Similarly, prayers to Jesus, Buddha, or Krishna, to Saint Christopher, or Saint Jude or even to Muhammad, are not answered by them but are answered by Allah. Jesus did not tell his followers to worship him but to worship Allah. As the Qur'aan states:
"And behold Allah will say: "O Jesus the son of Mary Did you say to men, Worship me and my mother as gods besides Allah He will say" Glory to you I could never say what I had no right (to say')" (Soorah Al-Maa'idah 5:116).
Nor did he worship himself when he worshipped but rather he worshipped Allah. This basic principle is enshrined in the opening chapter of the Qur'aan, known as Soorah Al-Faatihah, verse 4:
"You alone do we worship and from you alone do we seek help".
Elsewhere, in the final book of revelation, the Qur'aan, Allah also said:
"And your Lord says: "Call on Me and I will answer your (prayer)." (Soorah Mu'min 40:60)
it is worth noting that the basic message of Islam is that Allah and His creation are distinctly different entities. Neither is Allah His creation or a part of it, nor is His creation Him or a part of Him.
This might seem obvious, but, man's worship of creation instead of the Creator is to a large degree based on ignorance of this concept. It is the belief that the essence of Allah is everywhere in His creation or that His divine being is or was present in some aspects of His creation, which has provided justification for the worship of creation though such worship maybe called the worship of Allah through his creation. How ever, the message of Islam as brought by the prophets of Allah is to worship only Allah and to avoid the worship of his creation either directly or indirectly. In the Our'aan Allah clearly states:
"For We assuredly sent amongst every people a prophet, (with the command) worship meand avoid false gods" (Soorah Al-Nahl 16:36)
When the idol worshipper is questioned as to why he or she bows down to idols created by men, the invariable reply is that they are not actually worshipping the stone image, but Allah who is present within it. They claim that the stone idol is only a focal point for Allah's essence and is not in itself Allah! One who has accepted the concept of the presence of God's being within His creation in any way will be obliged to accept this argument of idolatry. Whereas, one who understands the basic message of Islam and its implications would never concede to idolatry no matter how it is rationalized. Those who have claimed divinity for themselves down through the ages have often based their claims on the mistaken belief that Allah is present in man. They merely had to assert that although Allah according to their false beliefs, is in all of us, He is more present in them than in the rest of us. Hence, they claim, we should submit our will to them and worship them as they are either God in person or God concentrated within the person.
Similarly, those who have asserted the godhood of others after their passing have found fertile ground among those who accept the false belief of God's presence in man. One who has grasped the basic message of Islam and its implications could never agree to worship another human being under any circumstances. God's religion in essence is a clear call to the worship of the Creator and the rejection of creation-worship in any form. This is the meaning of the motto of Islam:
"Laa Ilaaha illallaah" (There is no god but Allah)
Its repetition automatically brings one within the fold of Islam and sincere belief in it guarantees one Paradise. Thus, the final Prophet of Islam is reported to have'said, "Any one who says: There is no god but Allah and dies holding that (belief) will enter paradise". (Reported by Abu Dharr and collected by Al-Bukhaaree and Muslim).
It consists in the submission to Allah as one God, yielding to Him by obeying His commandments, and the denial of polytheism and polytheists.
The Message Of Islam
Since the total submission of one's will to Allah represents the essence of worship, the basic message of Allah's divine religion, Islam is the worship of Allah alone and the avoidance of worship directed to any person, place or thing other than Allah. Since everything other than Allah, the Creator of all things, is Allah's creation; it may be said that Islam, in essence calls man away from the worship of creation and invites him to worship only its Creator. He is the only one deserving man's worship as it is only by His will that prayers are answered. If man prays to a tree and his prayers are answered, it was not the tree which answered his prayers but Allah who allowed the circumstances prayed for to take place. One might say, "That is obvious," however, to tree-worshippers it might not be. Similarly, prayers to Jesus, Buddha, or Krishna, to Saint Christopher, or Saint Jude or even to Muhammad, are not answered by them but are answered by Allah. Jesus did not tell his followers to worship him but to worship Allah. As the Qur'aan states:
"And behold Allah will say: "O Jesus the son of Mary Did you say to men, Worship me and my mother as gods besides Allah He will say" Glory to you I could never say what I had no right (to say')" (Soorah Al-Maa'idah 5:116).
Nor did he worship himself when he worshipped but rather he worshipped Allah. This basic principle is enshrined in the opening chapter of the Qur'aan, known as Soorah Al-Faatihah, verse 4:
"You alone do we worship and from you alone do we seek help".
Elsewhere, in the final book of revelation, the Qur'aan, Allah also said:
"And your Lord says: "Call on Me and I will answer your (prayer)." (Soorah Mu'min 40:60)
it is worth noting that the basic message of Islam is that Allah and His creation are distinctly different entities. Neither is Allah His creation or a part of it, nor is His creation Him or a part of Him.
This might seem obvious, but, man's worship of creation instead of the Creator is to a large degree based on ignorance of this concept. It is the belief that the essence of Allah is everywhere in His creation or that His divine being is or was present in some aspects of His creation, which has provided justification for the worship of creation though such worship maybe called the worship of Allah through his creation. How ever, the message of Islam as brought by the prophets of Allah is to worship only Allah and to avoid the worship of his creation either directly or indirectly. In the Our'aan Allah clearly states:
"For We assuredly sent amongst every people a prophet, (with the command) worship meand avoid false gods" (Soorah Al-Nahl 16:36)
When the idol worshipper is questioned as to why he or she bows down to idols created by men, the invariable reply is that they are not actually worshipping the stone image, but Allah who is present within it. They claim that the stone idol is only a focal point for Allah's essence and is not in itself Allah! One who has accepted the concept of the presence of God's being within His creation in any way will be obliged to accept this argument of idolatry. Whereas, one who understands the basic message of Islam and its implications would never concede to idolatry no matter how it is rationalized. Those who have claimed divinity for themselves down through the ages have often based their claims on the mistaken belief that Allah is present in man. They merely had to assert that although Allah according to their false beliefs, is in all of us, He is more present in them than in the rest of us. Hence, they claim, we should submit our will to them and worship them as they are either God in person or God concentrated within the person.
Similarly, those who have asserted the godhood of others after their passing have found fertile ground among those who accept the false belief of God's presence in man. One who has grasped the basic message of Islam and its implications could never agree to worship another human being under any circumstances. God's religion in essence is a clear call to the worship of the Creator and the rejection of creation-worship in any form. This is the meaning of the motto of Islam:
"Laa Ilaaha illallaah" (There is no god but Allah)
Its repetition automatically brings one within the fold of Islam and sincere belief in it guarantees one Paradise. Thus, the final Prophet of Islam is reported to have'said, "Any one who says: There is no god but Allah and dies holding that (belief) will enter paradise". (Reported by Abu Dharr and collected by Al-Bukhaaree and Muslim).
It consists in the submission to Allah as one God, yielding to Him by obeying His commandments, and the denial of polytheism and polytheists.
The True Religion – Part 3
By Abu Ameenah Bilal Philips
The Message Of False Religion
There are so many sects, cults, religions, philosophies, and movements in the world, all of which claim to be the right way or the only true path to Allah. How can one determine which one is correct or if, in fact, all are correct? The method by which the answer can be found is to clear away the superficial differences in the teachings of the various claimants to the ultimate truth, and identify the central object of worship to which they call, directly or indirectly. False religions all have in common one basic concept with regards to Allah. They either claim that all men are gods or that specific men were Allah or that nature is Allah or that Allah is a figment of man's imagination.
Thus, it may be stated that the basic message of false religion is that Allah may be worshipped in the form of His creation. False religion invites man to the worship of creation by calling the creation or some aspect of it God. For example, prophet Jesus invited his followers to worship Allah but those who claim to be his followers today call people to worship Jesus, claiming that he was Allah!
Buddha was a reformer who introduced a number of humanistic principles to the religion of India. He did not claim to be God nor did he suggest to his followers that he be an object of worship. Yet, today most Buddhists who are to be found outside of India have taken him to be God and prostrate to idols made in their perception of his likeness.
By using the principle of identifying the object of worship, false religion becomes very obvious and the contrived nature of their origin clear. As God said in the Our'aan:
LA
That which you worship besides Him are only names you and your forefathers have invented for which Allah has sent down no authority: The command belongs only to Allah:
He has commanded that you only worship Him; that is the right religion, but most men do not understand ". (Soorah Yoosuf 12:40)
It may be argued that all religions teach good things so why should it matter which one we follow. The reply is that all false religions teach the greatest evil, the worship of creation. Creation-worship is the greatest sin that man can commit because it contradicts the very purpose of his creation. Man was created to worship Allah alone as Allah has explicitly stated in the Our'aan:
"I have only created jinns and men, that they may worship me" (Soorah Zaareeyaat) 51:56
Consequently, the worship of creation, which is the essence of idolatry, is the only unforgivable sin. One who dies in this state of idolatry has sealed his fate in the next life. This is not an opinion, but a revealed fact stated by Allah in his final revelation to man:
"Verily Allah will not forgive the joining of partners with Him, but He may forgive (sins) less than that for whomsoever He wishes" (Soorah An- Nisaa 4:48 and 116)
The Message Of False Religion
There are so many sects, cults, religions, philosophies, and movements in the world, all of which claim to be the right way or the only true path to Allah. How can one determine which one is correct or if, in fact, all are correct? The method by which the answer can be found is to clear away the superficial differences in the teachings of the various claimants to the ultimate truth, and identify the central object of worship to which they call, directly or indirectly. False religions all have in common one basic concept with regards to Allah. They either claim that all men are gods or that specific men were Allah or that nature is Allah or that Allah is a figment of man's imagination.
Thus, it may be stated that the basic message of false religion is that Allah may be worshipped in the form of His creation. False religion invites man to the worship of creation by calling the creation or some aspect of it God. For example, prophet Jesus invited his followers to worship Allah but those who claim to be his followers today call people to worship Jesus, claiming that he was Allah!
Buddha was a reformer who introduced a number of humanistic principles to the religion of India. He did not claim to be God nor did he suggest to his followers that he be an object of worship. Yet, today most Buddhists who are to be found outside of India have taken him to be God and prostrate to idols made in their perception of his likeness.
By using the principle of identifying the object of worship, false religion becomes very obvious and the contrived nature of their origin clear. As God said in the Our'aan:
LA
That which you worship besides Him are only names you and your forefathers have invented for which Allah has sent down no authority: The command belongs only to Allah:
He has commanded that you only worship Him; that is the right religion, but most men do not understand ". (Soorah Yoosuf 12:40)
It may be argued that all religions teach good things so why should it matter which one we follow. The reply is that all false religions teach the greatest evil, the worship of creation. Creation-worship is the greatest sin that man can commit because it contradicts the very purpose of his creation. Man was created to worship Allah alone as Allah has explicitly stated in the Our'aan:
"I have only created jinns and men, that they may worship me" (Soorah Zaareeyaat) 51:56
Consequently, the worship of creation, which is the essence of idolatry, is the only unforgivable sin. One who dies in this state of idolatry has sealed his fate in the next life. This is not an opinion, but a revealed fact stated by Allah in his final revelation to man:
"Verily Allah will not forgive the joining of partners with Him, but He may forgive (sins) less than that for whomsoever He wishes" (Soorah An- Nisaa 4:48 and 116)
The True Religion – Part 4
By Abu Ameenah Bilal Philips
The Universality Of Islam
Since the consequences of false religion are so grave, the true religion of Allah must be universally understandable and attainable, not confined to any people, place or time. There can not be conditions like baptism, belief in a man, as a saviors etc., for a believer to enter paradise. Within the central principle of Islam and in its definition, (the surrender of one's will to God) lies the roots of Islam's universality. Whenever man comes to the realization that Allah is one and distinct from His creation, and submits himself to Allah, he becomes a Muslim in body and spirit and is eligible for paradise. Thus, anyone at anytime in the most remote region of the world can become a Muslim, a follower of God's religion, Islam, by merely rejecting the worship of creation and by turning to Allah (God) alone. It should be noted however, that the recognition of and submission to Allah requires that one chooses between right and wrong and such a choice implies accountability. Man will be held responsible for his choices, and, as such, he should try his utmost to do good and avoid evil. The ultimate good being the worship of Allah alone and the ultimate evil being the worship of His creation along with or instead of Allah. This fact is expressed in the final revelation as follows:
"Verily those who believe, those who follow the Jewish (Scriptures), the Christians and the Sabians any who believe In Allah and the last day, and work righteousness shall have their reward with their Lord; They will not be overcome by fear nor grief (Soorah Al-Baqarah 2:62).
If only they had stood by the law, the Gospel, and all the revelation that was sent to them from their Lord, they would have enjoyed happiness from every side. There is from among them a party on the right course; but many of them follow a course that is evil." (Soorah Al-Maa'idah 5:66)
The Universality Of Islam
Since the consequences of false religion are so grave, the true religion of Allah must be universally understandable and attainable, not confined to any people, place or time. There can not be conditions like baptism, belief in a man, as a saviors etc., for a believer to enter paradise. Within the central principle of Islam and in its definition, (the surrender of one's will to God) lies the roots of Islam's universality. Whenever man comes to the realization that Allah is one and distinct from His creation, and submits himself to Allah, he becomes a Muslim in body and spirit and is eligible for paradise. Thus, anyone at anytime in the most remote region of the world can become a Muslim, a follower of God's religion, Islam, by merely rejecting the worship of creation and by turning to Allah (God) alone. It should be noted however, that the recognition of and submission to Allah requires that one chooses between right and wrong and such a choice implies accountability. Man will be held responsible for his choices, and, as such, he should try his utmost to do good and avoid evil. The ultimate good being the worship of Allah alone and the ultimate evil being the worship of His creation along with or instead of Allah. This fact is expressed in the final revelation as follows:
"Verily those who believe, those who follow the Jewish (Scriptures), the Christians and the Sabians any who believe In Allah and the last day, and work righteousness shall have their reward with their Lord; They will not be overcome by fear nor grief (Soorah Al-Baqarah 2:62).
If only they had stood by the law, the Gospel, and all the revelation that was sent to them from their Lord, they would have enjoyed happiness from every side. There is from among them a party on the right course; but many of them follow a course that is evil." (Soorah Al-Maa'idah 5:66)
The True Religion – Part 5
By Abu Ameenah Bilal Philips
Recognition Of Allah
The question which arises here is, "How can all people be expected to believe in Allah given their varying backgrounds, societies and cultures? For people to be responsible for worshipping Allah they all have to have access to knowledge of Allah. The final revelation teaches that all mankind have the recognition of Allah imprinted on their souls, a part of their very nature with which they are created. In Soorah Al-A'raaf, Verses 172-173; Allah explained that when He created Adam, He caused all of Adam's descendants to come into existence and took a pledge from them saying, Am I not your Lord? To which they all replied," Yes, we testify to It: Allah then explained why He had all of mankind bear witness that He is their creator and only true God worthy of worship. He said, "That was in case you (mankind) should say on the day of Resurrection, "Verily we were unaware of all this." That is to say, we had no idea that You Allah, were our God. No one told us that we were only supposed to worship You alone. Allah went on to explain That it was also in case you should say, "Certainly It was our ancestors who made partners (With Allah) and we are only their descendants; will You then destroy us for what those liars did?" Thus, every child is born with a natural belief in Allah and an inborn inclination to worship Him alone called in Arabic the "Fitrah".
If the child were left alone, he would worship Allah in his own way, but all children are affected by those things around them, seen or unseen. The Prophet (PBUH) reported that Allah said, "I created my servants in the right religion but devils made them go astray". The Prophet (PBUH) also said, "Each child is born in a state of "Fitrah", then his parents make him a Jew, Christian or a Zoroastrian, the way an animal gives birth to a normal offspring. Have you noticed any that were born mutilated?" (Collected by Al-Bukhaaree and Muslim). So, just as the child submits to the physical laws which Allah has put in nature, his soul also submits naturally to the fact that Allah is his Lord and Creator. But, his parents try to make him follow their own way and the child is not strong enough in the early stages of his life to resist or oppose the will of his parents. The religion which the child follows at this stage is one of custom and upbringing and Allah does not hold him to account or punish him for this religion.
Throughout people's lives from childhood until the time they die, signs are shown to them in all regions of the earth and in their own souls, until it becomes clear that there is only one true God (Allah). If the people are honest with themselves, reject their false gods and seek Allah, the way will be made easy for them but if they continually reject Allah's signs and continue to worship creation, the more difficult it will be for them to escape. For example, in the South Eastern region of the Amazon jungle in Brazil, South America, a primitive tribe erected a new hut to house their main idol Skwatch, representing the supreme God of all creation. The following day a young man entered the hut to pay homage to the God, and while he was in prostration to what he had been taught was his Creator and Sustainer, a mangy old flea-ridden dog walked into the hut, The young man looked up in time to seethe dog lift its hind leg and pass urine on the idol. Outraged, the youth chased the dog out of the temple, but when his rage died down he realized that the idol could not be the Lord of the universe. Allah must be elsewhere. He now had a choice to act on his knowledge and seek Allah, or to dishonestly go along with the false beliefs of his tribe. As strange as it may seem, that was a sign from Allah for that young man. It contained within it divine guidance that what he was worshipping was false.
Prophets were sent, as was earlier mentioned, to every nation and tribe to support man's natural belief in Allah and man's inborn inclination to worship Him as well as to reinforce the divine truth in the daily signs revealed by Allah. Although, in most cases, much of the prophets' teachings became distorted, portions remained which point out right and wrong. For example, the ten commandments of the Torah, their confirmation in the Gospels and the existence of laws against murder, stealing and adultery in most societies.
Consequently, every soul will be held to account for its belief in Allah and its acceptance of the religion of Islam; the total submission to the will of Allah.
We pray to Allah, the exalted, to keep us on the right path to which He has guided us, and to bestow on us a blessing from Him, He is indeed the Most Merciful. Praise and gratitude be to Allah, the Lord of the worlds, and peace and blessings be on prophet Muhammed, his Family, his companions, and those who rightly follow them.
Email to: Ayman@pcmail-bld40.uow.edu.au
http://media.isnet.org/off/Islam/Etc/true_rel.html
Recognition Of Allah
The question which arises here is, "How can all people be expected to believe in Allah given their varying backgrounds, societies and cultures? For people to be responsible for worshipping Allah they all have to have access to knowledge of Allah. The final revelation teaches that all mankind have the recognition of Allah imprinted on their souls, a part of their very nature with which they are created. In Soorah Al-A'raaf, Verses 172-173; Allah explained that when He created Adam, He caused all of Adam's descendants to come into existence and took a pledge from them saying, Am I not your Lord? To which they all replied," Yes, we testify to It: Allah then explained why He had all of mankind bear witness that He is their creator and only true God worthy of worship. He said, "That was in case you (mankind) should say on the day of Resurrection, "Verily we were unaware of all this." That is to say, we had no idea that You Allah, were our God. No one told us that we were only supposed to worship You alone. Allah went on to explain That it was also in case you should say, "Certainly It was our ancestors who made partners (With Allah) and we are only their descendants; will You then destroy us for what those liars did?" Thus, every child is born with a natural belief in Allah and an inborn inclination to worship Him alone called in Arabic the "Fitrah".
If the child were left alone, he would worship Allah in his own way, but all children are affected by those things around them, seen or unseen. The Prophet (PBUH) reported that Allah said, "I created my servants in the right religion but devils made them go astray". The Prophet (PBUH) also said, "Each child is born in a state of "Fitrah", then his parents make him a Jew, Christian or a Zoroastrian, the way an animal gives birth to a normal offspring. Have you noticed any that were born mutilated?" (Collected by Al-Bukhaaree and Muslim). So, just as the child submits to the physical laws which Allah has put in nature, his soul also submits naturally to the fact that Allah is his Lord and Creator. But, his parents try to make him follow their own way and the child is not strong enough in the early stages of his life to resist or oppose the will of his parents. The religion which the child follows at this stage is one of custom and upbringing and Allah does not hold him to account or punish him for this religion.
Throughout people's lives from childhood until the time they die, signs are shown to them in all regions of the earth and in their own souls, until it becomes clear that there is only one true God (Allah). If the people are honest with themselves, reject their false gods and seek Allah, the way will be made easy for them but if they continually reject Allah's signs and continue to worship creation, the more difficult it will be for them to escape. For example, in the South Eastern region of the Amazon jungle in Brazil, South America, a primitive tribe erected a new hut to house their main idol Skwatch, representing the supreme God of all creation. The following day a young man entered the hut to pay homage to the God, and while he was in prostration to what he had been taught was his Creator and Sustainer, a mangy old flea-ridden dog walked into the hut, The young man looked up in time to seethe dog lift its hind leg and pass urine on the idol. Outraged, the youth chased the dog out of the temple, but when his rage died down he realized that the idol could not be the Lord of the universe. Allah must be elsewhere. He now had a choice to act on his knowledge and seek Allah, or to dishonestly go along with the false beliefs of his tribe. As strange as it may seem, that was a sign from Allah for that young man. It contained within it divine guidance that what he was worshipping was false.
Prophets were sent, as was earlier mentioned, to every nation and tribe to support man's natural belief in Allah and man's inborn inclination to worship Him as well as to reinforce the divine truth in the daily signs revealed by Allah. Although, in most cases, much of the prophets' teachings became distorted, portions remained which point out right and wrong. For example, the ten commandments of the Torah, their confirmation in the Gospels and the existence of laws against murder, stealing and adultery in most societies.
Consequently, every soul will be held to account for its belief in Allah and its acceptance of the religion of Islam; the total submission to the will of Allah.
We pray to Allah, the exalted, to keep us on the right path to which He has guided us, and to bestow on us a blessing from Him, He is indeed the Most Merciful. Praise and gratitude be to Allah, the Lord of the worlds, and peace and blessings be on prophet Muhammed, his Family, his companions, and those who rightly follow them.
Email to: Ayman@pcmail-bld40.uow.edu.au
http://media.isnet.org/off/Islam/Etc/true_rel.html
16.6.09
Christian Extremism
According to the evangelicals so influential in today's America, only 'born again' Christians are on their way to Heaven, the Jews are doomed and the rest of us including non 'born again' Christians are not really on God's 'radar screen' at all until He calls us forth to be slain at Armageddon. And extremely worrying for Muslims, one of the things that has to happen before the time of the end can come, is not only the re-establishment of Israel but also that the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem must be rebuilt on its ancient site. This necessitates destroying the Haram ash-Sharif and the al-Aqsa mosque.
by Ruqaiyyah Waris Maqsood
the author of over thirty books on Islam
During my stay at ISNA headquarters in Plainfield, I was granted the opportunity to read through Grace Halsell's startling book 'Forcing God's Hand', Crossroads International Publishing, Washington DC, 1999.
The effect upon me was to leave me in a state of some shock - for what was being presented in these pages as an increasingly common form of Christianity in the USA had virtually nothing to do with the Christianity I had grown up with and studied as a university student reading Christian Theology. I managed to graduate in that field, with my main interest being Trinitarian Studies and Doctrine, in 1963. I am also English, and I should imagine from what I read that the kind of Christian background we have in the UK is very different from that in the USA, if we can assume that Grace Halsell has presented her case fairly.
According to Dale Crowley Jr, a Washington religious broadcaster whom she quotes, 'There's a new religious cult in America. It's not composed of so-called 'crazies' so much as mainstream, middle to upper-middle class Americans. They listen - and give millions of dollars each week - to the TV evangelists who expound the fundamentals of the cult. They read Hal Lindsey and Tim LaHaye. They have one goal: to facilitate God's hand to waft them up to heaven free from all trouble, from where they will watch Armageddon and the destruction of Planet Earth. This doctrine pervades Assemblies of God, Pentecostal, and other charismatic churches, as well as Southern Baptist, Independent Baptist, and countless so-called Bible churches and mega-churches. At least one out of every ten Americans is a devotee of this cult. It is the fastest growing religious movement in Christianity today.'
It comes as a great shock to me, for when I read the accounts of their major tenets and beliefs, it really just seemed like a great deal of nonsense. It had virtually no point of contact whatsoever with the church teaching, mission work and theology with which I have been involved one way or another for over fifty years, firstly as a Christian theologian myself, and then as a Muslim.
I give just one quote from Hal Lindsey's 'The Late Great Planet Earth' to give a flavour of what I am talking about:
'Think of it! At least 200 million soldiers from the orient, with millions more from the forces of the West.....Messiah Jesus will strike those who have ravaged His city in Jerusalem. Then He will strike the armies massed in the valley of Megiddo (or Armageddon). No wonder blood will stand to the horses' bridles for a distance of 200 miles from Jerusalem. ...This whole valley will be filled with war materials, animals, bodies of men, and blood! It seems incredible! The human mind cannot conceive of such inhumanity of man to man, yet God will allow man's nature to fully display itself that day. Every city of the world will be destroyed - London, Paris, Tokyo, New York, Los Angeles, Chicago - obliterated!'
Bible references are sifted for prophecies of a future world-wide nuclear war. The Antichrist due to come before all this has been 'recognised' already, many times, in such people as Hitler, Mussolini, Stalin, Saddam Hussein, Milosovic. There is presumably another 'Beast' to come.
Some of this may sound familiar to Muslims who have considered how the end of the world will come, with the prophecies of the Dajjal and so forth.
However, 'born-again' Christians will have the good fortune to escape all the suffering of nuclear holocaust, because God will cause them to be taken up alive into the heavens before all this takes place, where they will have a grandstand view of everyone else being destroyed. Christ will descend and 'snatch away' his true followers. This belief is not actually any part of the teachings of Jesus, but is based on a couple of verses of St Paul's, namely, First Thessalonians 4:16-17.
This, naturally, is the great appeal of the entire notion. 'It's wonderful to know,' said one of Grace Halwell's interviewees, 'that those of us who are Saved do not have to suffer one moment of agony in the final days.'
It results in a great deal of religious and spiritual blackmail. Those who believe in it are absolutely certain that God will mete out to most of the dead and currently alive - in fact, all who are not and were not 'born again' - a fearful destruction and an everlasting punishment.
There is another aspect that is extremely worrying for Muslims. One of the things that has to happen before the time of the end can come, is not only that the kingdom of Israel must be re-established, (which may refer to the setting up of the state in 1948), but also that the Temple must be rebuilt on its ancient site. This necessitates destroying the Haram ash-Sharif and the al-Aqsa mosque, of course. Until I read Grace Halwell's book, I used to scoff in the UK at what I regarded as extra-ordinary fears and suppositions I heard from some Muslim quarters. Now, I am nowhere near so complacent.
For example, to quote Hal Lindsey again: 'There remains but one more event to completely set the stage for Israel's part in the last great act of her historical drama. This is to rebuild the ancient Temple of worship upon its old site.' Not only that, but the rare red heifers are already being bred in readiness to restart the sacrificial system.
It is a strange mix, for most of these 'born again' so-called Christians seem to have a very hearty dislike of Jews. They are only really using them as a means to an end. Needless to say, they have an extremely hearty dislike of Muslims, who have inconveniently somehow got themselves in the way of the whole thing.
So, what is the point of my article? It is this - as we have entered the new century, many enlightened Muslims, Jews and Christians have all realised at last the most important aspect of our Prophet Muhammad's (saw) teaching about our relationship is that we should come together as all worshippers of the same One True God, whether we name Him Jehovah (Yahweh), Our Father, or Allah. He is the same Almighty One, the same Creator, the same Compassionate and Merciful One. The Jews and Christians have all followed their revelations from this same God, through the same line of prophets as are named and accepted in the revelation of the Qur'an. Yes, we have differences of beliefs and theology - which are inevitably based on the limits of our own intellects, and faith in what has seemed reasonable to us and, these days, in accord with the principles of science. We have differences of practice and the ways we worship. But our moral code is the same, our desire to please our Lord by right and compassionate and just living is the same, our wish to follow the right path is the same. We were urged to come to accord, and concentrate on that which is common between us - for it is really scandalous that so much blood has been shed, and so much hostility engendered, between people who are all servants of the same One True God.
We must remember that our real enemy is not other people, but Shaytan, and that Shaytan is extremely clever and can come in any disguise. He is also extremely religious. Don't forget that the original sin of Shaytan was to refuse to do what God wished him to do, because he thought he knew best. That is, better than God Himself.
When Shaytan insinuates himself into a person's mind, whether it be to promote ignorance, or extremism, or hatred, one of the main signs is the manifestation of what Muslims call takfir - the insistence that the individual is right and is completely following the ways of God, and that all others who disagree in any detail are kafirs or unbelievers, and will be condemned to Hellfire. This is a very prominent feature of the Christian Fundamentalism Grace Halwell talks about. We Muslims have to realise, of course, that it is also a prominent feature of Islamic Fundamentalism too; I have found that a useful 'rule of thumb' in identifying extremism is to listen out for the word kafir or kuffar (pl), and to be aware that to these zealots the kuffar are not only 'the West' (whatever that means), or non-Muslims, but large numbers of Muslims too.
Similarly, these Christian Extremists do not identify other Christians as being real Christians. Only these 'born again' will be saved. And what is the experience of this being 'born again?' It is usually an emotional moment, even a trance-like state, brought about by hypnotic fiery sermons and religiously seductive music. It appeals to a certain type, and is generally a great 'turn-off' for more sober academics and down-to-earth people.
Muslims can easily point to similar problems with immature sufis and ignorant pretenders of spiritual excellence giving wide publicity to trance utterances and inspired pronouncements, along with their grandiloquent claims.
Thus it is a simple matter for fascinating preachers, money-grubbing pastors, hypocritical dervishes and cunning traders of religion to take full advantage of the popular relish for esoteric matters, miracles, supernatural performances, inspired dreams and prophecies. It can all too easily be seen that simple pious people can be led into accepting every new fantasy. It all appeals strongly to those who want to feel they are on the 'inside' of a group, with secrets, profound knowledge and revelations.
But really, they have an exceedingly narrow view of the 'nature' of God, or His purposes for His created Earth and the six billion people on it. Their 'tribal' God is only concerned with these 'special' Christians, and the Jews. However, the 14 million Jews now estimated to be on earth are doomed, whereas only the billion or so 'born again' Christians are on their way to Heaven. The other 5 billion peoples of the world are not really on God's 'radar screen' at all until He calls them forth to be slain at Armageddon.
Rotten luck for us - and for all who genuinely believe in another sort of Divine Being. Direct conflict with these types is usually a waste of time and energy, so what should we do? I think, what we do best. Carry on presenting the realities of the noble faith of Islam, trying to reconcile geniune Jews and Christians with ourselves in genuine faith in God, perhaps by downplaying our differences, as the Prophet (saw) advised. We are not here to force, or bribe, or brow-beat, like these Fundamentalists. We are here to guide, to set an example, to display the sunnah in the way we live. And then leave intelligent people to think for themselves, and make their choice.
by Ruqaiyyah Waris Maqsood
the author of over thirty books on Islam
During my stay at ISNA headquarters in Plainfield, I was granted the opportunity to read through Grace Halsell's startling book 'Forcing God's Hand', Crossroads International Publishing, Washington DC, 1999.
The effect upon me was to leave me in a state of some shock - for what was being presented in these pages as an increasingly common form of Christianity in the USA had virtually nothing to do with the Christianity I had grown up with and studied as a university student reading Christian Theology. I managed to graduate in that field, with my main interest being Trinitarian Studies and Doctrine, in 1963. I am also English, and I should imagine from what I read that the kind of Christian background we have in the UK is very different from that in the USA, if we can assume that Grace Halsell has presented her case fairly.
According to Dale Crowley Jr, a Washington religious broadcaster whom she quotes, 'There's a new religious cult in America. It's not composed of so-called 'crazies' so much as mainstream, middle to upper-middle class Americans. They listen - and give millions of dollars each week - to the TV evangelists who expound the fundamentals of the cult. They read Hal Lindsey and Tim LaHaye. They have one goal: to facilitate God's hand to waft them up to heaven free from all trouble, from where they will watch Armageddon and the destruction of Planet Earth. This doctrine pervades Assemblies of God, Pentecostal, and other charismatic churches, as well as Southern Baptist, Independent Baptist, and countless so-called Bible churches and mega-churches. At least one out of every ten Americans is a devotee of this cult. It is the fastest growing religious movement in Christianity today.'
It comes as a great shock to me, for when I read the accounts of their major tenets and beliefs, it really just seemed like a great deal of nonsense. It had virtually no point of contact whatsoever with the church teaching, mission work and theology with which I have been involved one way or another for over fifty years, firstly as a Christian theologian myself, and then as a Muslim.
I give just one quote from Hal Lindsey's 'The Late Great Planet Earth' to give a flavour of what I am talking about:
'Think of it! At least 200 million soldiers from the orient, with millions more from the forces of the West.....Messiah Jesus will strike those who have ravaged His city in Jerusalem. Then He will strike the armies massed in the valley of Megiddo (or Armageddon). No wonder blood will stand to the horses' bridles for a distance of 200 miles from Jerusalem. ...This whole valley will be filled with war materials, animals, bodies of men, and blood! It seems incredible! The human mind cannot conceive of such inhumanity of man to man, yet God will allow man's nature to fully display itself that day. Every city of the world will be destroyed - London, Paris, Tokyo, New York, Los Angeles, Chicago - obliterated!'
Bible references are sifted for prophecies of a future world-wide nuclear war. The Antichrist due to come before all this has been 'recognised' already, many times, in such people as Hitler, Mussolini, Stalin, Saddam Hussein, Milosovic. There is presumably another 'Beast' to come.
Some of this may sound familiar to Muslims who have considered how the end of the world will come, with the prophecies of the Dajjal and so forth.
However, 'born-again' Christians will have the good fortune to escape all the suffering of nuclear holocaust, because God will cause them to be taken up alive into the heavens before all this takes place, where they will have a grandstand view of everyone else being destroyed. Christ will descend and 'snatch away' his true followers. This belief is not actually any part of the teachings of Jesus, but is based on a couple of verses of St Paul's, namely, First Thessalonians 4:16-17.
This, naturally, is the great appeal of the entire notion. 'It's wonderful to know,' said one of Grace Halwell's interviewees, 'that those of us who are Saved do not have to suffer one moment of agony in the final days.'
It results in a great deal of religious and spiritual blackmail. Those who believe in it are absolutely certain that God will mete out to most of the dead and currently alive - in fact, all who are not and were not 'born again' - a fearful destruction and an everlasting punishment.
There is another aspect that is extremely worrying for Muslims. One of the things that has to happen before the time of the end can come, is not only that the kingdom of Israel must be re-established, (which may refer to the setting up of the state in 1948), but also that the Temple must be rebuilt on its ancient site. This necessitates destroying the Haram ash-Sharif and the al-Aqsa mosque, of course. Until I read Grace Halwell's book, I used to scoff in the UK at what I regarded as extra-ordinary fears and suppositions I heard from some Muslim quarters. Now, I am nowhere near so complacent.
For example, to quote Hal Lindsey again: 'There remains but one more event to completely set the stage for Israel's part in the last great act of her historical drama. This is to rebuild the ancient Temple of worship upon its old site.' Not only that, but the rare red heifers are already being bred in readiness to restart the sacrificial system.
It is a strange mix, for most of these 'born again' so-called Christians seem to have a very hearty dislike of Jews. They are only really using them as a means to an end. Needless to say, they have an extremely hearty dislike of Muslims, who have inconveniently somehow got themselves in the way of the whole thing.
So, what is the point of my article? It is this - as we have entered the new century, many enlightened Muslims, Jews and Christians have all realised at last the most important aspect of our Prophet Muhammad's (saw) teaching about our relationship is that we should come together as all worshippers of the same One True God, whether we name Him Jehovah (Yahweh), Our Father, or Allah. He is the same Almighty One, the same Creator, the same Compassionate and Merciful One. The Jews and Christians have all followed their revelations from this same God, through the same line of prophets as are named and accepted in the revelation of the Qur'an. Yes, we have differences of beliefs and theology - which are inevitably based on the limits of our own intellects, and faith in what has seemed reasonable to us and, these days, in accord with the principles of science. We have differences of practice and the ways we worship. But our moral code is the same, our desire to please our Lord by right and compassionate and just living is the same, our wish to follow the right path is the same. We were urged to come to accord, and concentrate on that which is common between us - for it is really scandalous that so much blood has been shed, and so much hostility engendered, between people who are all servants of the same One True God.
We must remember that our real enemy is not other people, but Shaytan, and that Shaytan is extremely clever and can come in any disguise. He is also extremely religious. Don't forget that the original sin of Shaytan was to refuse to do what God wished him to do, because he thought he knew best. That is, better than God Himself.
When Shaytan insinuates himself into a person's mind, whether it be to promote ignorance, or extremism, or hatred, one of the main signs is the manifestation of what Muslims call takfir - the insistence that the individual is right and is completely following the ways of God, and that all others who disagree in any detail are kafirs or unbelievers, and will be condemned to Hellfire. This is a very prominent feature of the Christian Fundamentalism Grace Halwell talks about. We Muslims have to realise, of course, that it is also a prominent feature of Islamic Fundamentalism too; I have found that a useful 'rule of thumb' in identifying extremism is to listen out for the word kafir or kuffar (pl), and to be aware that to these zealots the kuffar are not only 'the West' (whatever that means), or non-Muslims, but large numbers of Muslims too.
Similarly, these Christian Extremists do not identify other Christians as being real Christians. Only these 'born again' will be saved. And what is the experience of this being 'born again?' It is usually an emotional moment, even a trance-like state, brought about by hypnotic fiery sermons and religiously seductive music. It appeals to a certain type, and is generally a great 'turn-off' for more sober academics and down-to-earth people.
Muslims can easily point to similar problems with immature sufis and ignorant pretenders of spiritual excellence giving wide publicity to trance utterances and inspired pronouncements, along with their grandiloquent claims.
Thus it is a simple matter for fascinating preachers, money-grubbing pastors, hypocritical dervishes and cunning traders of religion to take full advantage of the popular relish for esoteric matters, miracles, supernatural performances, inspired dreams and prophecies. It can all too easily be seen that simple pious people can be led into accepting every new fantasy. It all appeals strongly to those who want to feel they are on the 'inside' of a group, with secrets, profound knowledge and revelations.
But really, they have an exceedingly narrow view of the 'nature' of God, or His purposes for His created Earth and the six billion people on it. Their 'tribal' God is only concerned with these 'special' Christians, and the Jews. However, the 14 million Jews now estimated to be on earth are doomed, whereas only the billion or so 'born again' Christians are on their way to Heaven. The other 5 billion peoples of the world are not really on God's 'radar screen' at all until He calls them forth to be slain at Armageddon.
Rotten luck for us - and for all who genuinely believe in another sort of Divine Being. Direct conflict with these types is usually a waste of time and energy, so what should we do? I think, what we do best. Carry on presenting the realities of the noble faith of Islam, trying to reconcile geniune Jews and Christians with ourselves in genuine faith in God, perhaps by downplaying our differences, as the Prophet (saw) advised. We are not here to force, or bribe, or brow-beat, like these Fundamentalists. We are here to guide, to set an example, to display the sunnah in the way we live. And then leave intelligent people to think for themselves, and make their choice.
12.6.09
Understanding Politics in Islam - Fiqh al Siyasah
Adapted and rearranged from the book Fiqh al-Dawlah written by Professor Yusuf al Qaradawi.
1. What is the aim of politics in Islam?
According to Al-Mawardi from his book Al-Ahkam Al-Sultaniyyah, it is hirasatud din wa siasatud dunya - to uphold the religion and administer the world. Politics is not munkar - is not a depravity - real politics is noble virtuous because it administers the affairs of all creatures, bringing man closer to good and away from fasad - evil. According to Ibn al-Qayyim, politics is really the justice of Allah the Almighty and His Prophet (peace and the blessings of Allah be upon him).
The Prophet Muhammad s.a.w. was a politician as well as the messenger conveying the risalah, murabbi - teacher, Qadi - Chief Justice, Head of the nation and Imam of the ummah. The Khulafa' al Rasyidun - the rightly guided leaders who succeeded him were also politicians following the Sunnah - way of the Prophet, establishing just administration, practising ihsan - the betterment of good and providing the leadership of 'ilm - knowledge and Iman - belief.
However in the present time, due to 'politics' man faced suffering as a result of deceit and political ploys and scheming and devious politicians, whether in the form of past colonialists, treacherous rulers, tyrannical leaders and regimes preaching Machiavellian philosophy (the ends justifies the means!).
It became common to label and describe committed Muslims as 'political' so that they are regarded warily and wickedly for the purpose of disassociating and furthering apart the people from them, intending that society will shun and hate what is called 'political Islam'. It has been such that symbols of Islam like the headscarf, the proper attire and congregational prayers - Salat jama'ah are attempted to be labelled 'political'.
It is a blatant lie for those who say that there is no religion in politics and that there is no politics in religion. This deceit was once tried in the form of an attempted fatwa - a decree while the members of the Ikhwan al-Muslimun were imprisoned in the detention camps in Egypt in the 50's. The regime wanted to influence the masses to regard the activists and the Dai' (the very people who wanted to uphold the Syari'ah, Al-Qur'an and Al-Sunnah) as the purveyors of fasad - evil by using corrupted 'ulama - paid scholars.
2. The Fight against Fasad and Zulm (Evil, Transgression and Tyranny) is the utmost in Jihad
From the understanding of the Prophet's tradition (mafhum hadith):
Munkar (transgression) is not limited to khamr - liqour, gambling and zina - - unlawful sex but degrading and defiling the honour and dignity of the people and citizens is a major transgression, so is cheating in the elections, refusing to give testimony - neglecting to vote, letting government be in the hands of those who are not deserving and undesired, stealing and squandering the nation's wealth and property, monopolising the people's needs for personal gains or cronies' interests, detaining people without crime or just cause, without judgement from a fair court, torturing human beings in prison and the detention camps, giving, accepting and mediating in bribes, cowering up to, praising evil rulers, allowing the enemies of Allah and the enemies of the Muslim community to be leaders and shunning the believers - the mu'min.
These are all grave transgressions!
When a Muslim remains quiet upon seeing all of these it means that he or she does not deserve to live (is not alive) from the mafhum of al-ayat and al-hadith.
Islam requires that every Muslim has political responsibility. A Muslim is required by his Iman - faith to be truly concerned with the affairs and problems of the ummah - community, helping and defending the meek and the weak, fighting tyranny and oppression. By retreating and abstaining oneself, it will only invite divine retribution and being seized by the flames of hell (mafhum ayat).
3. Political Freedom is Our Utmost Need Today
Islam is always rejuvenated, its message spread across, its resurgence, its reverberating call heard by all even if it is given some limited freedom. Therefore the first battle is to obtain freedom to deliver the message of da'wah, the risalah of tawhid (Unity of God), spread consciousness and enabling the existence of Islamic movements.
True democracy is not the whims and desires of the tyrannical rulers or their cronies, it is not the place to jail and incarcerate its fighters and not the place to torture its proponents.
Democracy is the simplest and proper way to achieve the aims of a noble life, to be able to invite all to Allah and Islam, to be able to call others to Iman without having our souls being imprisoned and our bodies sentenced to be executed by hanging. It is the space for a free and honourable nation to have the right to choose, evaluate the ruler, change governments without coups and without bloodshed.
The theory, way and system which looks alien maybe adopted if it benefits us and as long as it does not contradict clear Islamic edicts and the rules of Syariah. We appraise, amend according to our spirit, we do not adopt its philosophy, and we do not allow what is forbidden and vice versa. We do not relinquish or compromise what is ordained or compulsory - the wajib in Islam.
The gist of democracy is that the public, the people can choose the rulers who are going to administer them; the people having the right to select, criticise and terminate; and the people are not forced to accept systems, trends, and policies which they do not agree to and they are not abused. They are free to hold elections, referendums, ensuring majority rights, protecting minority rights, having opposition, have multi parties, have press freedom and safeguarding the independence of the judiciary. But once again to constantly uphold and safeguard the principles of Islam, the firm rulings, the al-thawabit: the determined laws - hukm qat'i, the daruri - the essentials of religion and the non-ijtihadiy must not be compromised or neglected.
Syura:
Syura or consultative decision making must be followed and not just as a debating factor. By practising syura, it is closer, hence even better than the spirit of democracy. It is but the lost jewel found, the lost wisdom - al-hikmah which has been rediscovered.
Syura enables musyawarah to be conducted, obtains views and opinions, becomes the responsibility of the people to advise and counsel the government (ad-dinu nasiha) and establish amar ma'ruf nahy munkar - enjoining good and forbidding evil. Among the obligations of amar ma'ruf nahy munkar is the highest jihad (struggle) that is to voice out the truth in front of the unjust tyrant.
The State of Politics in the Ummah:
The musibah or calamity of the ummah then and now is the absence and the abeyying of the system of syura and the adoption of an oppressive dynastical ruling system. In the modern era, dictators stay in power by the force of arms and gold - power and wealth resulting in the syariah being hindered, secularism being forced upon and cultural Westernisation being imposed. Islamic da'wah and the Islamic movement being victimised, brutalised, imprisoned and hounded viciously.
4. Qur'anic Examples of Tyrannical Rulers
The Al-Qur'an denounces all powerful rulers such as Namrud, Fir'aun (Pharaoh), Hamaan and Qarun. Namrud is taghut - the transgressor who enslaves the servants of Allah as his serfs.
There is the pact or collaboration of three parties:
Fir'aun - he claims to be God, carries out tyranny and oppression throughout the land, enslaves the people
Hamaan - the cunning politician, experienced, having self interest, in the service of taghut, propping up and supporting Fir'aun and cheating the people, subjugating them.
Qarun - the capitalist or feudalist who takes opportunity from the unjust and oppressive laws, spending fortunes for the tyrannical leader in order to profit and amass more vast returns, bleeding and exploiting the toils of the people. The origin of Qarun was that he came from Prophet Musa's own clan who colluded with Fir'aun due to the love of worldly life and materialism.
The combination of taghut and Zulm results in the spread of mayhem and the destruction of the community, subjugating man by force and degradation.
The People:
Al Qur'an denounces the people or citizens who are obedient and loyal to their oppressive rulers. The people who remain under the tutelage of taghut are fully responsible and accountable because it is due to their attitude that brought forth these fir'auns and taghuts.
Al-Junud (the collaborators):
These are the armies and enforcers of the rule and order of the taghut. They use force, fear and repression to eliminate and subdue all opposition and dissidents of the tyrant.
5. An Example of Leadership
Balqis, the Queen of Saba' as told in the Qur'an was a woman who lead her people well, just and administered them with intelligence and wisdom saving her people from a war that was destructive and made decisions by syura-consulting them. Alas, the story ended with the acceptance of Islam. She led her people towards the goodness of the world and the hereafter.
Leaders like her are much more capable and qualified with political acumen and wise administration than most of the present Arab and Muslim 'male' leaders. (Prof. Yusuf Qaradawi purposely avoided the term 'al-rijal')
6. Pluralism and Multi Parties in Islam
The existence of various parties or movements is not forbidden as long as unification is not achievable due to differences over objectives, approaches, understanding and the level of confidence and trust. Variety and specialisation are allowed as long as they do not become contradictory and confrontational. However everyone has to be in one united front when facing the challenges to aqidah - belief, syariah, ummah and the survival of Islam. Relations between parties and groupings should be in the atmosphere of non-prejudice, forgiveness, nobleness, counselling truth and steadfastness, wisdom and engaging in healthy cordial debate.
Even when the Islamic State is established there is no reason to feel distraught at the existence of pluralism and differences.
7. Counselling and Corrective Participation in Politics
Without the shedding of blood, the most effective way as the outcome of long and painful struggles is the existence of political forces which the government in power is unable to contain or eliminate: that is presence of political parties. The ruling regime can get rid of individuals and small groups of opponents but it is difficult for them to defeat or wipe out larger organisations which are well structured, organised and rooted in the masses of society. Political parties have the platform, machinery, newspapers and publications as well as mass influence.
Political parties or political movements are necessary to fight oppression, to enable criticism, bringing back the government to to uphold truth and justice, bringing down or changing the government. These parties are capable of monitoring and appraising the government, offer advice and criticism.
8. Voting
Voting in the elections is a form of testimony. A just testimony is considered as long as one is not convicted of crime. Whoever so votes or abstains from voting in the general elections causing the defeat of a trustworthy and deserving candidate but on the other hand allows the candidate who is less trustworthy and undeserving to win, one has gone against the command of Allah concerning giving testimony.
1. What is the aim of politics in Islam?
According to Al-Mawardi from his book Al-Ahkam Al-Sultaniyyah, it is hirasatud din wa siasatud dunya - to uphold the religion and administer the world. Politics is not munkar - is not a depravity - real politics is noble virtuous because it administers the affairs of all creatures, bringing man closer to good and away from fasad - evil. According to Ibn al-Qayyim, politics is really the justice of Allah the Almighty and His Prophet (peace and the blessings of Allah be upon him).
The Prophet Muhammad s.a.w. was a politician as well as the messenger conveying the risalah, murabbi - teacher, Qadi - Chief Justice, Head of the nation and Imam of the ummah. The Khulafa' al Rasyidun - the rightly guided leaders who succeeded him were also politicians following the Sunnah - way of the Prophet, establishing just administration, practising ihsan - the betterment of good and providing the leadership of 'ilm - knowledge and Iman - belief.
However in the present time, due to 'politics' man faced suffering as a result of deceit and political ploys and scheming and devious politicians, whether in the form of past colonialists, treacherous rulers, tyrannical leaders and regimes preaching Machiavellian philosophy (the ends justifies the means!).
It became common to label and describe committed Muslims as 'political' so that they are regarded warily and wickedly for the purpose of disassociating and furthering apart the people from them, intending that society will shun and hate what is called 'political Islam'. It has been such that symbols of Islam like the headscarf, the proper attire and congregational prayers - Salat jama'ah are attempted to be labelled 'political'.
It is a blatant lie for those who say that there is no religion in politics and that there is no politics in religion. This deceit was once tried in the form of an attempted fatwa - a decree while the members of the Ikhwan al-Muslimun were imprisoned in the detention camps in Egypt in the 50's. The regime wanted to influence the masses to regard the activists and the Dai' (the very people who wanted to uphold the Syari'ah, Al-Qur'an and Al-Sunnah) as the purveyors of fasad - evil by using corrupted 'ulama - paid scholars.
2. The Fight against Fasad and Zulm (Evil, Transgression and Tyranny) is the utmost in Jihad
From the understanding of the Prophet's tradition (mafhum hadith):
Munkar (transgression) is not limited to khamr - liqour, gambling and zina - - unlawful sex but degrading and defiling the honour and dignity of the people and citizens is a major transgression, so is cheating in the elections, refusing to give testimony - neglecting to vote, letting government be in the hands of those who are not deserving and undesired, stealing and squandering the nation's wealth and property, monopolising the people's needs for personal gains or cronies' interests, detaining people without crime or just cause, without judgement from a fair court, torturing human beings in prison and the detention camps, giving, accepting and mediating in bribes, cowering up to, praising evil rulers, allowing the enemies of Allah and the enemies of the Muslim community to be leaders and shunning the believers - the mu'min.
These are all grave transgressions!
When a Muslim remains quiet upon seeing all of these it means that he or she does not deserve to live (is not alive) from the mafhum of al-ayat and al-hadith.
Islam requires that every Muslim has political responsibility. A Muslim is required by his Iman - faith to be truly concerned with the affairs and problems of the ummah - community, helping and defending the meek and the weak, fighting tyranny and oppression. By retreating and abstaining oneself, it will only invite divine retribution and being seized by the flames of hell (mafhum ayat).
3. Political Freedom is Our Utmost Need Today
Islam is always rejuvenated, its message spread across, its resurgence, its reverberating call heard by all even if it is given some limited freedom. Therefore the first battle is to obtain freedom to deliver the message of da'wah, the risalah of tawhid (Unity of God), spread consciousness and enabling the existence of Islamic movements.
True democracy is not the whims and desires of the tyrannical rulers or their cronies, it is not the place to jail and incarcerate its fighters and not the place to torture its proponents.
Democracy is the simplest and proper way to achieve the aims of a noble life, to be able to invite all to Allah and Islam, to be able to call others to Iman without having our souls being imprisoned and our bodies sentenced to be executed by hanging. It is the space for a free and honourable nation to have the right to choose, evaluate the ruler, change governments without coups and without bloodshed.
The theory, way and system which looks alien maybe adopted if it benefits us and as long as it does not contradict clear Islamic edicts and the rules of Syariah. We appraise, amend according to our spirit, we do not adopt its philosophy, and we do not allow what is forbidden and vice versa. We do not relinquish or compromise what is ordained or compulsory - the wajib in Islam.
The gist of democracy is that the public, the people can choose the rulers who are going to administer them; the people having the right to select, criticise and terminate; and the people are not forced to accept systems, trends, and policies which they do not agree to and they are not abused. They are free to hold elections, referendums, ensuring majority rights, protecting minority rights, having opposition, have multi parties, have press freedom and safeguarding the independence of the judiciary. But once again to constantly uphold and safeguard the principles of Islam, the firm rulings, the al-thawabit: the determined laws - hukm qat'i, the daruri - the essentials of religion and the non-ijtihadiy must not be compromised or neglected.
Syura:
Syura or consultative decision making must be followed and not just as a debating factor. By practising syura, it is closer, hence even better than the spirit of democracy. It is but the lost jewel found, the lost wisdom - al-hikmah which has been rediscovered.
Syura enables musyawarah to be conducted, obtains views and opinions, becomes the responsibility of the people to advise and counsel the government (ad-dinu nasiha) and establish amar ma'ruf nahy munkar - enjoining good and forbidding evil. Among the obligations of amar ma'ruf nahy munkar is the highest jihad (struggle) that is to voice out the truth in front of the unjust tyrant.
The State of Politics in the Ummah:
The musibah or calamity of the ummah then and now is the absence and the abeyying of the system of syura and the adoption of an oppressive dynastical ruling system. In the modern era, dictators stay in power by the force of arms and gold - power and wealth resulting in the syariah being hindered, secularism being forced upon and cultural Westernisation being imposed. Islamic da'wah and the Islamic movement being victimised, brutalised, imprisoned and hounded viciously.
4. Qur'anic Examples of Tyrannical Rulers
The Al-Qur'an denounces all powerful rulers such as Namrud, Fir'aun (Pharaoh), Hamaan and Qarun. Namrud is taghut - the transgressor who enslaves the servants of Allah as his serfs.
There is the pact or collaboration of three parties:
Fir'aun - he claims to be God, carries out tyranny and oppression throughout the land, enslaves the people
Hamaan - the cunning politician, experienced, having self interest, in the service of taghut, propping up and supporting Fir'aun and cheating the people, subjugating them.
Qarun - the capitalist or feudalist who takes opportunity from the unjust and oppressive laws, spending fortunes for the tyrannical leader in order to profit and amass more vast returns, bleeding and exploiting the toils of the people. The origin of Qarun was that he came from Prophet Musa's own clan who colluded with Fir'aun due to the love of worldly life and materialism.
The combination of taghut and Zulm results in the spread of mayhem and the destruction of the community, subjugating man by force and degradation.
The People:
Al Qur'an denounces the people or citizens who are obedient and loyal to their oppressive rulers. The people who remain under the tutelage of taghut are fully responsible and accountable because it is due to their attitude that brought forth these fir'auns and taghuts.
Al-Junud (the collaborators):
These are the armies and enforcers of the rule and order of the taghut. They use force, fear and repression to eliminate and subdue all opposition and dissidents of the tyrant.
5. An Example of Leadership
Balqis, the Queen of Saba' as told in the Qur'an was a woman who lead her people well, just and administered them with intelligence and wisdom saving her people from a war that was destructive and made decisions by syura-consulting them. Alas, the story ended with the acceptance of Islam. She led her people towards the goodness of the world and the hereafter.
Leaders like her are much more capable and qualified with political acumen and wise administration than most of the present Arab and Muslim 'male' leaders. (Prof. Yusuf Qaradawi purposely avoided the term 'al-rijal')
6. Pluralism and Multi Parties in Islam
The existence of various parties or movements is not forbidden as long as unification is not achievable due to differences over objectives, approaches, understanding and the level of confidence and trust. Variety and specialisation are allowed as long as they do not become contradictory and confrontational. However everyone has to be in one united front when facing the challenges to aqidah - belief, syariah, ummah and the survival of Islam. Relations between parties and groupings should be in the atmosphere of non-prejudice, forgiveness, nobleness, counselling truth and steadfastness, wisdom and engaging in healthy cordial debate.
Even when the Islamic State is established there is no reason to feel distraught at the existence of pluralism and differences.
7. Counselling and Corrective Participation in Politics
Without the shedding of blood, the most effective way as the outcome of long and painful struggles is the existence of political forces which the government in power is unable to contain or eliminate: that is presence of political parties. The ruling regime can get rid of individuals and small groups of opponents but it is difficult for them to defeat or wipe out larger organisations which are well structured, organised and rooted in the masses of society. Political parties have the platform, machinery, newspapers and publications as well as mass influence.
Political parties or political movements are necessary to fight oppression, to enable criticism, bringing back the government to to uphold truth and justice, bringing down or changing the government. These parties are capable of monitoring and appraising the government, offer advice and criticism.
8. Voting
Voting in the elections is a form of testimony. A just testimony is considered as long as one is not convicted of crime. Whoever so votes or abstains from voting in the general elections causing the defeat of a trustworthy and deserving candidate but on the other hand allows the candidate who is less trustworthy and undeserving to win, one has gone against the command of Allah concerning giving testimony.
5.6.09
Islamic political philosophy: Al-Farabi, Avicenna, Averroes Part 1
Islam is based on the Koran (a revelation from God to the prophet Muhammad) supplemented by the sunnah (a set of traditions about Muhammad's words and deeds). Muslims recognise Judaism and Christianity as revelations from God (just as Christianity recognises Judaism), but hold that the revelation made to Muhammad completes and supersedes earlier revelations. Muslims reject the Christian doctrines that Jesus was God and that God is in three persons (Father, Son, Holy Spirit); they believe that Jesus was a prophet and that God is one.
Islam spread rapidly from its birthplace in Arabia. In part its spread was due to jihad ('holy war' - see Encyclopaedia of Islam (ref/DS37.E523), vol. 2, pp. 538-40, art. 'Djihad'); non-Muslims defeated in battle were offered the choice of conversion or death. An exception was made for Jews and Christians, who were allowed to continue their religious observances provided they acknowledged Muslim political authority and paid a tax. In this way there came to be in Muslim lands many communities of Christians and Jews, who sometimes acted as intermediaries in cultural exchange between Muslims and the Greeks and the Latins. Thus Arab Christians were among the translators who (about A.D. 800) translated the works of Plato and Aristotle into Arabic, and Arabic-speaking Jews were among the translators who (in the 12th century) translated Greek and Arabic works of science and philosophy from Arabic into Latin. The bulk of Aristotle's works became known in Europe first in translations of Arabic translations from Greek (though translations were soon made direct into Latin from Greek) and were accompanied by translations of the Arabic writings of Muslim philosophers. Abu Nasr Muhammad al-Farabi, Abu 'Ali al-Husayn Ibn Sina and Abu al-Walid Muhammad Ibn Ahmad Ibn Rushd were well known in the universities of medieval Europe under the Latinised forms of their names, Alfarabi, Avicenna and Averroes.
The works on politics written by the Islamic philosophers were based especially on Plato, with influence also from Aristotle's Ethics; Aristotle's Politics was not well-known, though Aristotle's other works were. Greek Neo-Platonists (Plotinus, Porphyry, Proclus and others) had tried to combine the philosophies of Plato and Aristotle; they held that these philosophies were fundamentally in harmony. This view was passed on to the Islamic philosophers, who expounded a more or less Platonized Aristotelianism.
Islam spread rapidly from its birthplace in Arabia. In part its spread was due to jihad ('holy war' - see Encyclopaedia of Islam (ref/DS37.E523), vol. 2, pp. 538-40, art. 'Djihad'); non-Muslims defeated in battle were offered the choice of conversion or death. An exception was made for Jews and Christians, who were allowed to continue their religious observances provided they acknowledged Muslim political authority and paid a tax. In this way there came to be in Muslim lands many communities of Christians and Jews, who sometimes acted as intermediaries in cultural exchange between Muslims and the Greeks and the Latins. Thus Arab Christians were among the translators who (about A.D. 800) translated the works of Plato and Aristotle into Arabic, and Arabic-speaking Jews were among the translators who (in the 12th century) translated Greek and Arabic works of science and philosophy from Arabic into Latin. The bulk of Aristotle's works became known in Europe first in translations of Arabic translations from Greek (though translations were soon made direct into Latin from Greek) and were accompanied by translations of the Arabic writings of Muslim philosophers. Abu Nasr Muhammad al-Farabi, Abu 'Ali al-Husayn Ibn Sina and Abu al-Walid Muhammad Ibn Ahmad Ibn Rushd were well known in the universities of medieval Europe under the Latinised forms of their names, Alfarabi, Avicenna and Averroes.
The works on politics written by the Islamic philosophers were based especially on Plato, with influence also from Aristotle's Ethics; Aristotle's Politics was not well-known, though Aristotle's other works were. Greek Neo-Platonists (Plotinus, Porphyry, Proclus and others) had tried to combine the philosophies of Plato and Aristotle; they held that these philosophies were fundamentally in harmony. This view was passed on to the Islamic philosophers, who expounded a more or less Platonized Aristotelianism.
Islamic political philosophy: Al-Farabi, Avicenna, Averroes Part 2
Al-Farabi (ca. 870-950 A.D.)
The following is based on extracts in R. Lerner and M. Mahdi, Medieval Political Philosophy (JA82.L4) from Al-Farabi's 'Book of Agreement between the ideas of the two philosophers, the divine Plato and Aristotle'. Two key ideas: (1) Aristotle's idea of Nature as a source of development toward a mature state; (2) Aristotle's distinction between demonstrative argument and merely persuasive argument - i.e. between argument that gives genuine knowledge and understanding and argument that induces the hearer to believe a conclusion without understanding the fundamental reason why it is so (see Aristotle, Analytica Posteriora, 71 b19-23).
According to Al-Farabi, human beings, like any natural species, have a perfect state toward which their actions tend.
[H]e cannot labour toward this perfection except by exploiting a large number of natural beings and until he manipulates them to render them useful... [A]n isolated individual cannot achieve all the perfections by himself and without the aid of many other individuals. It is the innate disposition of every man to join another human being or other men in the labour he ought to perform... Therefore, to achieve what he can of that perfection, every man needs to stay in the neighborhood of others and associate with them... which is why he is called the social and political animal (p. 60).
Compare Plato, Protagoras, 322. Republic 369-371, Aristotle, Politics, I.2.
[P]olitical association and the totality that results from the association of citizens in cities correspond to the association of the bodies that constitute the totality of the world... Just as in the world there is a first principle, then other principles subordinate to it, beings that proceed from these principles, other beings subordinate to these beings, until they terminate in the beings with the lowest rank in the order of being, the nation or the city includes a supreme commander, followed by other commanders, followed by other citizens, who in turn are followed by other citizens, until they terminate in the citizens with the lowest rank as citizens and as human beings. Thus the city includes the likenesses of the things included in the total world (p. 61).
Hierarchy, order, is a characteristic neo-Platonic theme; cf. Augustine.
Human beings differ in their natural capacity to acquire the virtues required in a ruler. Therefore
not every chance human being will possess art, moral virtue, and deliberative virtue with great power. Therefore the prince occupies his place by nature and not merely by will. Similarly, a subordinate occupies his place primarily by nature... This being the case, the theoretical virtue, the highest deliberative virtue, the highest moral virtue, and the highest practical art [politics] are realised only in those equipped for them by nature: that is, in those who possess superior natures with very great potentialities (p. 69).
Cf. Aristotle, Politics, I.5; Plato, Republic, 415a.
The person with the most superior natural capacity and acquired virtue must realise these perfections in nations and cities. There are two primary methods: verbal instruction, and the formation of character by making certain modes of action habitual.
Instruction in the theoretical science should be given either to the imams and princes, or else to those who should preserve the theoretical sciences... [T]hey should be made to pursue a course of study and form the habits of character from their childhood until each of them reaches maturity, in accordance with the plan described by Plato [in the sections of the Republic on the education of the guardians]. Then the princes [leaders] among them will be placed in subordinate offices and promoted gradually through the ranks until they are fifty years old. Then they will be placed in the office with the highest authority... [T]hey are the elect who should not be confined to what is in conformity with unexamined common opinion. [For all of this cf. Plato's Republic.] In the earlier stages they should be instructed by means of persuasive arguments and similitudes [as contrasted with demonstrative arguments and knowledge of the thing itself] (p. 70).
The virtue or art of the prince is exercised by directing those who have the lower virtues or arts, whom he uses to instruct and form the character of the various categories of citizens - some by persuasion, some by compulsion (including holy war - the prince needs 'the faculty that enables him to excel in organising and leading armies and utilising war implements and warlike people to conquer the nations and cities that do not submit to doing what will procure them that happiness for whose acquisition man is made', p. 71). In using persuasion, the prince should go back to the things he studied demonstratively and look for persuasive arguments and similitudes and devise methods of political oratory. [Cf. Plato, Statesman, 303e-304a, 309cd; Phaedrus, 271b, d; Laws, 719e-720e, 722d-723d]. Since it aims at the perfection of all mankind, philosophy seeks political power. 'To be a truly perfect philosopher one has to possess both the theoretical sciences and the faculty for exploiting them for the benefit of all others according to their capacity. Were one to consider the case of the true philosopher, he would find no difference between him and the supreme ruler' (p. 76). [Cf. Plato, Republic, 473cd.]
Now when one... receives instruction.., if he perceives their ideas themselves with his intellect, and his assent to them is by means of certain demonstration, then the science that comprises these cognitions is philosophy. But if they are known by imagining them through similitudes that imitate them, and assent to what is imagined of them is caused by persuasive methods, then the ancients call what comprises these cognitions religion... Therefore, according to the ancients, religion is an imitation of philosophy. Both comprise the same subjects and both give an account of the ultimate principles of the beings. For both supply knowledge about the first principle and cause of the beings, and both give an account of the ultimate end for the sake of which man is made - that is, supreme happiness - and the ultimate end of every one of the other beings. In everything of which philosophy gives an account based on intellectual perception or conception, religion gives an account based on imagination. In everything demonstrated by philosophy, religion employs persuasion - (p. 77).
'It follows, then, that the idea of Imam, Philosopher and Legislator is a single idea' (p. 78).
It will be noticed that the implication is that Muhammad is the philosopher-king, but that the philosophers are superior to those who are merely religious.
The following is based on extracts in R. Lerner and M. Mahdi, Medieval Political Philosophy (JA82.L4) from Al-Farabi's 'Book of Agreement between the ideas of the two philosophers, the divine Plato and Aristotle'. Two key ideas: (1) Aristotle's idea of Nature as a source of development toward a mature state; (2) Aristotle's distinction between demonstrative argument and merely persuasive argument - i.e. between argument that gives genuine knowledge and understanding and argument that induces the hearer to believe a conclusion without understanding the fundamental reason why it is so (see Aristotle, Analytica Posteriora, 71 b19-23).
According to Al-Farabi, human beings, like any natural species, have a perfect state toward which their actions tend.
[H]e cannot labour toward this perfection except by exploiting a large number of natural beings and until he manipulates them to render them useful... [A]n isolated individual cannot achieve all the perfections by himself and without the aid of many other individuals. It is the innate disposition of every man to join another human being or other men in the labour he ought to perform... Therefore, to achieve what he can of that perfection, every man needs to stay in the neighborhood of others and associate with them... which is why he is called the social and political animal (p. 60).
Compare Plato, Protagoras, 322. Republic 369-371, Aristotle, Politics, I.2.
[P]olitical association and the totality that results from the association of citizens in cities correspond to the association of the bodies that constitute the totality of the world... Just as in the world there is a first principle, then other principles subordinate to it, beings that proceed from these principles, other beings subordinate to these beings, until they terminate in the beings with the lowest rank in the order of being, the nation or the city includes a supreme commander, followed by other commanders, followed by other citizens, who in turn are followed by other citizens, until they terminate in the citizens with the lowest rank as citizens and as human beings. Thus the city includes the likenesses of the things included in the total world (p. 61).
Hierarchy, order, is a characteristic neo-Platonic theme; cf. Augustine.
Human beings differ in their natural capacity to acquire the virtues required in a ruler. Therefore
not every chance human being will possess art, moral virtue, and deliberative virtue with great power. Therefore the prince occupies his place by nature and not merely by will. Similarly, a subordinate occupies his place primarily by nature... This being the case, the theoretical virtue, the highest deliberative virtue, the highest moral virtue, and the highest practical art [politics] are realised only in those equipped for them by nature: that is, in those who possess superior natures with very great potentialities (p. 69).
Cf. Aristotle, Politics, I.5; Plato, Republic, 415a.
The person with the most superior natural capacity and acquired virtue must realise these perfections in nations and cities. There are two primary methods: verbal instruction, and the formation of character by making certain modes of action habitual.
Instruction in the theoretical science should be given either to the imams and princes, or else to those who should preserve the theoretical sciences... [T]hey should be made to pursue a course of study and form the habits of character from their childhood until each of them reaches maturity, in accordance with the plan described by Plato [in the sections of the Republic on the education of the guardians]. Then the princes [leaders] among them will be placed in subordinate offices and promoted gradually through the ranks until they are fifty years old. Then they will be placed in the office with the highest authority... [T]hey are the elect who should not be confined to what is in conformity with unexamined common opinion. [For all of this cf. Plato's Republic.] In the earlier stages they should be instructed by means of persuasive arguments and similitudes [as contrasted with demonstrative arguments and knowledge of the thing itself] (p. 70).
The virtue or art of the prince is exercised by directing those who have the lower virtues or arts, whom he uses to instruct and form the character of the various categories of citizens - some by persuasion, some by compulsion (including holy war - the prince needs 'the faculty that enables him to excel in organising and leading armies and utilising war implements and warlike people to conquer the nations and cities that do not submit to doing what will procure them that happiness for whose acquisition man is made', p. 71). In using persuasion, the prince should go back to the things he studied demonstratively and look for persuasive arguments and similitudes and devise methods of political oratory. [Cf. Plato, Statesman, 303e-304a, 309cd; Phaedrus, 271b, d; Laws, 719e-720e, 722d-723d]. Since it aims at the perfection of all mankind, philosophy seeks political power. 'To be a truly perfect philosopher one has to possess both the theoretical sciences and the faculty for exploiting them for the benefit of all others according to their capacity. Were one to consider the case of the true philosopher, he would find no difference between him and the supreme ruler' (p. 76). [Cf. Plato, Republic, 473cd.]
Now when one... receives instruction.., if he perceives their ideas themselves with his intellect, and his assent to them is by means of certain demonstration, then the science that comprises these cognitions is philosophy. But if they are known by imagining them through similitudes that imitate them, and assent to what is imagined of them is caused by persuasive methods, then the ancients call what comprises these cognitions religion... Therefore, according to the ancients, religion is an imitation of philosophy. Both comprise the same subjects and both give an account of the ultimate principles of the beings. For both supply knowledge about the first principle and cause of the beings, and both give an account of the ultimate end for the sake of which man is made - that is, supreme happiness - and the ultimate end of every one of the other beings. In everything of which philosophy gives an account based on intellectual perception or conception, religion gives an account based on imagination. In everything demonstrated by philosophy, religion employs persuasion - (p. 77).
'It follows, then, that the idea of Imam, Philosopher and Legislator is a single idea' (p. 78).
It will be noticed that the implication is that Muhammad is the philosopher-king, but that the philosophers are superior to those who are merely religious.
Islamic political philosophy: Al-Farabi, Avicenna, Averroes Part 3
Avicenna (980-1037 A.D.)
The extracts in the Readings come from Avicenna, The Healing, 'Metaphysics', Book X (translated M.E. Marmura, in Lerner and Mahdi, p. 99 ff).
Read Chapter 2 (pp. 99-101).
Compare Plato, Protagoras, 322. Republic 369-371.
'The First Principle': God.
'xvi, 102' and the like are references to the Koran.
'He ought not to involve them': religious knowledge does not include everything that philosophers should know.
'Nor is it proper... vulgar': This explains why Muhammad never indicated that parts of the Koran were to be interpreted allegorically.
Read chapter 3, pp. 101-3.
Thus Avicenna finds philosophical reasons for the practices of religion.
Read chapter 5, pp. 107-110
'Caliph' means 'successor', i.e. of Muhammad. 'Imam' means 'leader'.
'If a city other than his has praiseworthy laws': This and the rest of the paragraph seem to be intended to explain why Jews and Christians are to be treated more leniently.
'Acts that harm the individual himself': Avicenna, like J.S. Mill much later, thought that people should not be legally compelled for their own good.
Averroes, 1126-1198 A.D.
Al-Farabi and Avicenna lived in the eastern part of the Islamic world; Averroes lived in Spain, at that time partly under Muslim control. He was a judge in the city of Cordova. He wrote a series of commentaries on the works of Aristotle, which were translated into Latin and were very influential in the universities of medieval Europe.
In Islamic culture 'philosophy' (in the sense of a continuation Greek philosophy) was somewhat suspect. It never gained a foothold in publically supported educational institutions, it was never well connected with any profession (in contrast with western Europe after the 12th century, where philosophy was the main subject in Arts faculties of the universities). The subject best established in medieval Islamic education was the study of the law (i.e. of the religious law). The extracts from Averroes in the Readings are from The Decisive Treatise Determining the Nature of the Connection between Religion and Philosophy, in which Averroes tries to show (with a readership of lawyers primarily in mind) that philosophy is a legitmate study for Muslims - indeed, that it is the highest form of religion. Like Alfarabi, and like Plato, Averroes envisages a state in which philosophers are the elite. The extracts are from the translation by G.F. Hourani in A. Hyman and J.J. Walsh, Philosophy in the Middle Ages (B721.P48), p. 287 ff)
Read chapter 1, pp. 287-291.
The headings in small print (e.g. 'What is the attitude of the Law to philosophy?', 'If teleological study... then the Law commands philosophy') are not part of the original text but have been supplied by editor or translator.
'teleological': in terms of purpose or end (Greek telos, 'end').
'The Artisan': God, the maker of the world.
'LIX, 2' and the like: references to the Koran.
'Demonstrative', 'dialectical' and 'rhetorical' reasoning: According to Aristotle 'demonstrative' reasoning gives certainty and understanding by showing the reasons why the thing is and must be so. 'Dialectical' reasoning shows that it is probably so by reasons that give no understanding or certainty (e.g. arguments from what is commonly believed, or analogies). 'Rhetorical' arguments induce the listener (perhaps by some emotional appeal) to believe that the thing is so. (Plato used 'dialectic' for the highest form of reasoning; Aristotle gave the word a less favourable meaning.)
'The lawyer': i.e. the student of the religious law of Islam.
'Syllogisms': arguments.
'regardless... shares our religion': Averroes' great antagonist, Al-Ghazali, held similarly liberal views on this topic. 'If we adopt the attitude of abstaining from every truth that the mind of a heretic has apprehended before us, we should be obliged to abstain from much that is true' (Al-Ghazali, in Hyman and Walsh, p. 273).
'Those ancients who studied these matters before Islam': that is, the Greek philosophers.
'For the natures of men are on different levels': This was also the view of Al-Farabi and Avicenna, who also inferred that philosophy was for the elite and religion for the masses.
Read chapter 2, pp. 292-4
Note the argument that on theoretical matters it can never be shown that there has been unanimity, since some of the experts may have believed that they should not communicate their knowledge to the public.
The next few pages are omitted, since they go into controversies on technical questions of philosophy.
Read Chapter 3, pp. 301-6.
'Abu Hamid': Al-Ghazali, whose book The Incoherence of the Philosophers was an attack on philosophy.
'Accidentally certain': i.e. 'happen to be certain'. A dialectical argument uses as premisses common beliefs, and there is no guarantee that commonly held beliefs are true; but it may happen in some instance that they are true.
The rest of the chapter is clear enough.
Like Al-Farabi, Averroes holds that philosophy and Islam are in harmony, that superior intellects ought to philosophise but not in public, that ordinary people should be taught by means of the Koran and the traditions without trying to turn them into philosophers. (Compare Plato's city, where ordinary people are ruled by philosophers who know what is good for them better than they do themselves.) Note that these Muslim philosophers do not suggest (and presumably did not believe) that the Koran and the traditions are in any way false: by a miracle, God has provided a book that is both perfectly accessible to ordinary people and a true guide.
Further Reading
Encyclopaedia of Philosophy (ref/B41.E5), art. 'Islamic philosophy'; R. Lerner and M. Mahdi, Medieval Political Philosophy (JA82.L4).
The extracts in the Readings come from Avicenna, The Healing, 'Metaphysics', Book X (translated M.E. Marmura, in Lerner and Mahdi, p. 99 ff).
Read Chapter 2 (pp. 99-101).
Compare Plato, Protagoras, 322. Republic 369-371.
'The First Principle': God.
'xvi, 102' and the like are references to the Koran.
'He ought not to involve them': religious knowledge does not include everything that philosophers should know.
'Nor is it proper... vulgar': This explains why Muhammad never indicated that parts of the Koran were to be interpreted allegorically.
Read chapter 3, pp. 101-3.
Thus Avicenna finds philosophical reasons for the practices of religion.
Read chapter 5, pp. 107-110
'Caliph' means 'successor', i.e. of Muhammad. 'Imam' means 'leader'.
'If a city other than his has praiseworthy laws': This and the rest of the paragraph seem to be intended to explain why Jews and Christians are to be treated more leniently.
'Acts that harm the individual himself': Avicenna, like J.S. Mill much later, thought that people should not be legally compelled for their own good.
Averroes, 1126-1198 A.D.
Al-Farabi and Avicenna lived in the eastern part of the Islamic world; Averroes lived in Spain, at that time partly under Muslim control. He was a judge in the city of Cordova. He wrote a series of commentaries on the works of Aristotle, which were translated into Latin and were very influential in the universities of medieval Europe.
In Islamic culture 'philosophy' (in the sense of a continuation Greek philosophy) was somewhat suspect. It never gained a foothold in publically supported educational institutions, it was never well connected with any profession (in contrast with western Europe after the 12th century, where philosophy was the main subject in Arts faculties of the universities). The subject best established in medieval Islamic education was the study of the law (i.e. of the religious law). The extracts from Averroes in the Readings are from The Decisive Treatise Determining the Nature of the Connection between Religion and Philosophy, in which Averroes tries to show (with a readership of lawyers primarily in mind) that philosophy is a legitmate study for Muslims - indeed, that it is the highest form of religion. Like Alfarabi, and like Plato, Averroes envisages a state in which philosophers are the elite. The extracts are from the translation by G.F. Hourani in A. Hyman and J.J. Walsh, Philosophy in the Middle Ages (B721.P48), p. 287 ff)
Read chapter 1, pp. 287-291.
The headings in small print (e.g. 'What is the attitude of the Law to philosophy?', 'If teleological study... then the Law commands philosophy') are not part of the original text but have been supplied by editor or translator.
'teleological': in terms of purpose or end (Greek telos, 'end').
'The Artisan': God, the maker of the world.
'LIX, 2' and the like: references to the Koran.
'Demonstrative', 'dialectical' and 'rhetorical' reasoning: According to Aristotle 'demonstrative' reasoning gives certainty and understanding by showing the reasons why the thing is and must be so. 'Dialectical' reasoning shows that it is probably so by reasons that give no understanding or certainty (e.g. arguments from what is commonly believed, or analogies). 'Rhetorical' arguments induce the listener (perhaps by some emotional appeal) to believe that the thing is so. (Plato used 'dialectic' for the highest form of reasoning; Aristotle gave the word a less favourable meaning.)
'The lawyer': i.e. the student of the religious law of Islam.
'Syllogisms': arguments.
'regardless... shares our religion': Averroes' great antagonist, Al-Ghazali, held similarly liberal views on this topic. 'If we adopt the attitude of abstaining from every truth that the mind of a heretic has apprehended before us, we should be obliged to abstain from much that is true' (Al-Ghazali, in Hyman and Walsh, p. 273).
'Those ancients who studied these matters before Islam': that is, the Greek philosophers.
'For the natures of men are on different levels': This was also the view of Al-Farabi and Avicenna, who also inferred that philosophy was for the elite and religion for the masses.
Read chapter 2, pp. 292-4
Note the argument that on theoretical matters it can never be shown that there has been unanimity, since some of the experts may have believed that they should not communicate their knowledge to the public.
The next few pages are omitted, since they go into controversies on technical questions of philosophy.
Read Chapter 3, pp. 301-6.
'Abu Hamid': Al-Ghazali, whose book The Incoherence of the Philosophers was an attack on philosophy.
'Accidentally certain': i.e. 'happen to be certain'. A dialectical argument uses as premisses common beliefs, and there is no guarantee that commonly held beliefs are true; but it may happen in some instance that they are true.
The rest of the chapter is clear enough.
Like Al-Farabi, Averroes holds that philosophy and Islam are in harmony, that superior intellects ought to philosophise but not in public, that ordinary people should be taught by means of the Koran and the traditions without trying to turn them into philosophers. (Compare Plato's city, where ordinary people are ruled by philosophers who know what is good for them better than they do themselves.) Note that these Muslim philosophers do not suggest (and presumably did not believe) that the Koran and the traditions are in any way false: by a miracle, God has provided a book that is both perfectly accessible to ordinary people and a true guide.
Further Reading
Encyclopaedia of Philosophy (ref/B41.E5), art. 'Islamic philosophy'; R. Lerner and M. Mahdi, Medieval Political Philosophy (JA82.L4).
1.6.09
How Islam Influenced Science
by: Macksood Aftab, Managing Editor of The Islamic Herald.
During the Middle Ages the Islamic World had a very significant impact upon Europe, which in turn cleared the way for the Renaissance and the Scientific Revolution. In the Medieval age, Islam and Muslims influenced Europe in a number of different ways. One of the most important of these subjects was Science.
Ever since Islam was born, Muslims had made immense leaps forward in the area of Science. Cities like Baghdad, Damascus, Cairo and Cordoba were the centers of civilization. These cities were flourishing and Muslim scientists made tremendous progress in applied as well as theoretical Science and Technology. In Europe, however, the situation was much different. Europe was in the Dark Ages. It had no infrastructure or central government. To the Muslims, Europe was backward, unorganized, carried no strategic importance and was essentially irrelevant. This considering the time period was in fact true. Nevertheless the Catholic Church (which at the time was the strongest institution in Europe) successfully convinced Christian Europe that the Muslims were infidels. This caused Europeans to think that Muslims were culturally inferior to Europe and thus Europe was unable to benefit from the new scientific discoveries being made in the Islamic lands before the 1100’s. By doing this Europe kept itself in the Dark Ages while from China to Spain Islamic Civilization prospered. During the Crusades there was limited contact between Muslims and Christians and not much was transferred. As A. Lewis explains, "The Crusaders were men of action, not men of learning". The real exchange of ideas which led to the Scientific revolution and to the renaissance occurred in Muslim Spain.
Cordoba was the capital of Muslim Spain. It soon became the center for all light and learning for the entire Europe. Scholars and students from various parts of the world and Europe came to Cordoba to study. The contrast in intellectual activity is demonstrated best by one example: ‘In the ninth century, the library of the monastery of St. Gall was the largest in Europe. It boasted 36 volumes. At the same time, that of Cordoba contained over 500,000!’.
The idea of the college was a concept which was borrowed from Muslims. The first colleges appeared in the Muslim world in the late 600's and early 700's. In Europe, some of the earliest colleges are those under the University of Paris and Oxford they were founded around the thirteenth century. These early European colleges were also funded by trusts similar to the Islamic ones and legal historians have traced them back to the Islamic system. The internal organization of these European colleges was strikingly similar to the Islamic ones, for example the idea of Graduate (Sahib) and undergraduate (mutafaqqih) is derived directly from Islamic terms.
In the field of Mathematics the number Zero (0) and the decimal system was introduced to Europe, which became the basis for the Scientific revolution. The Arabic numerals were also transferred to Europe, this made mathematical tasks much easier, problems that took days to solve could now be solved in minutes. The works of Al-Khwarizmi (Alghorismus) were translated into Latin. Alghorismus, from whom the mathematical term algorism was derived, wrote Sindhind, a compilation of astronomical tables. He, more importantly, laid the ground work for algebra and found methods to deal with complex mathematical problems, such as square roots and complex fractions. He conducted numerous experiments, measured the height of the earth's atmosphere and discovered the principle of the magnifying lens. Many of his books were translated into European languages. Trigonometric work by Alkirmani of Toledo was translated into Latin (from which we get the sine and cosine functions) along with the Greek knowledge of Geometry by Euclid. Along with mathematics, masses of other knowledge in the field of physical science was transferred.
Islamic contributions to Science were now rapidly being translated and transferred from Spain to the rest of Europe. Ibnul Hairham’s works on Optics, (in which he deals with 50 Optical questions put to Muslim Scholars by the Franks), was translated widely. The Muslims discovered the Principle of Pendulum, which was used to measure time. Many of the principles of Isaac Newton were derived from former Islamic scientific contributions. In the field of Chemistry numerous Islamic works were translated into Latin. One of the fields of study in this area was alchemy. The Muslims by exploring various elements, developed a good understanding of the constitution of matter. Jabir ibn-Hayyan (Geber) was the leading chemist in the Muslim world, some scholars link the introduction of the ‘scientific method’ back to him. A great number of terms used in Chemistry such as alchohol, alembic, alkali and elixir are of Islamic origin.
Medicine was a key science explored by Muslims. Al-Rhazes is one of the most famous Doctors and writers of Islamic History. Every major city had an hospital, the hospital at Cairo had over 8000 beds, with separate wards for fevers, ophthalmic, dysentery and surgical cases. He discovered the origin of smallpox and showed that one could only acquire it once in one's life, thus showing the existence of the immune system and how it worked. Muslim doctors were also aware of the contagious qualities of diseases. Hundreds of medical works were translated into Latin.
All of this knowledge transferred from the Muslims to the Europeans was the vital raw material for the Scientific Revolution. Muslims not only passed on Greek classical works but also introduced new scientific theories, without which the European Renaissance could not have occurred. Thus even though many of the Islamic contributions go unacknowledged, they played an integral role in the European transformation.
During the Middle Ages the Islamic World had a very significant impact upon Europe, which in turn cleared the way for the Renaissance and the Scientific Revolution. In the Medieval age, Islam and Muslims influenced Europe in a number of different ways. One of the most important of these subjects was Science.
Ever since Islam was born, Muslims had made immense leaps forward in the area of Science. Cities like Baghdad, Damascus, Cairo and Cordoba were the centers of civilization. These cities were flourishing and Muslim scientists made tremendous progress in applied as well as theoretical Science and Technology. In Europe, however, the situation was much different. Europe was in the Dark Ages. It had no infrastructure or central government. To the Muslims, Europe was backward, unorganized, carried no strategic importance and was essentially irrelevant. This considering the time period was in fact true. Nevertheless the Catholic Church (which at the time was the strongest institution in Europe) successfully convinced Christian Europe that the Muslims were infidels. This caused Europeans to think that Muslims were culturally inferior to Europe and thus Europe was unable to benefit from the new scientific discoveries being made in the Islamic lands before the 1100’s. By doing this Europe kept itself in the Dark Ages while from China to Spain Islamic Civilization prospered. During the Crusades there was limited contact between Muslims and Christians and not much was transferred. As A. Lewis explains, "The Crusaders were men of action, not men of learning". The real exchange of ideas which led to the Scientific revolution and to the renaissance occurred in Muslim Spain.
Cordoba was the capital of Muslim Spain. It soon became the center for all light and learning for the entire Europe. Scholars and students from various parts of the world and Europe came to Cordoba to study. The contrast in intellectual activity is demonstrated best by one example: ‘In the ninth century, the library of the monastery of St. Gall was the largest in Europe. It boasted 36 volumes. At the same time, that of Cordoba contained over 500,000!’.
The idea of the college was a concept which was borrowed from Muslims. The first colleges appeared in the Muslim world in the late 600's and early 700's. In Europe, some of the earliest colleges are those under the University of Paris and Oxford they were founded around the thirteenth century. These early European colleges were also funded by trusts similar to the Islamic ones and legal historians have traced them back to the Islamic system. The internal organization of these European colleges was strikingly similar to the Islamic ones, for example the idea of Graduate (Sahib) and undergraduate (mutafaqqih) is derived directly from Islamic terms.
In the field of Mathematics the number Zero (0) and the decimal system was introduced to Europe, which became the basis for the Scientific revolution. The Arabic numerals were also transferred to Europe, this made mathematical tasks much easier, problems that took days to solve could now be solved in minutes. The works of Al-Khwarizmi (Alghorismus) were translated into Latin. Alghorismus, from whom the mathematical term algorism was derived, wrote Sindhind, a compilation of astronomical tables. He, more importantly, laid the ground work for algebra and found methods to deal with complex mathematical problems, such as square roots and complex fractions. He conducted numerous experiments, measured the height of the earth's atmosphere and discovered the principle of the magnifying lens. Many of his books were translated into European languages. Trigonometric work by Alkirmani of Toledo was translated into Latin (from which we get the sine and cosine functions) along with the Greek knowledge of Geometry by Euclid. Along with mathematics, masses of other knowledge in the field of physical science was transferred.
Islamic contributions to Science were now rapidly being translated and transferred from Spain to the rest of Europe. Ibnul Hairham’s works on Optics, (in which he deals with 50 Optical questions put to Muslim Scholars by the Franks), was translated widely. The Muslims discovered the Principle of Pendulum, which was used to measure time. Many of the principles of Isaac Newton were derived from former Islamic scientific contributions. In the field of Chemistry numerous Islamic works were translated into Latin. One of the fields of study in this area was alchemy. The Muslims by exploring various elements, developed a good understanding of the constitution of matter. Jabir ibn-Hayyan (Geber) was the leading chemist in the Muslim world, some scholars link the introduction of the ‘scientific method’ back to him. A great number of terms used in Chemistry such as alchohol, alembic, alkali and elixir are of Islamic origin.
Medicine was a key science explored by Muslims. Al-Rhazes is one of the most famous Doctors and writers of Islamic History. Every major city had an hospital, the hospital at Cairo had over 8000 beds, with separate wards for fevers, ophthalmic, dysentery and surgical cases. He discovered the origin of smallpox and showed that one could only acquire it once in one's life, thus showing the existence of the immune system and how it worked. Muslim doctors were also aware of the contagious qualities of diseases. Hundreds of medical works were translated into Latin.
All of this knowledge transferred from the Muslims to the Europeans was the vital raw material for the Scientific Revolution. Muslims not only passed on Greek classical works but also introduced new scientific theories, without which the European Renaissance could not have occurred. Thus even though many of the Islamic contributions go unacknowledged, they played an integral role in the European transformation.
27.5.09
A Principle Central to the Islamic Social System
By : Adil Salahi, Arab News.
Abdullah ibn Abbas, the Prophet’s (peace be upon him) cousin and learned companion reports: “The Prophet was seated at the front of his house in Makkah when Uthman ibn Mathoon passed by and smiled at the Prophet. The Prophet said to him: ‘Would you like to sit with me?’ He said: ‘Yes.’ As he faced him and was talking to him, the Prophet looked up to the sky with his eyes fixed... Then he told him: ‘The messenger God sends me came to me now while you are sitting with me.’ He asked: ‘What did he say to you?’ He replied: ‘God enjoins justice, kindness, and generosity to one’s kindred; and He forbids all that is shameful, and reprehensible conduct, and all transgression. He admonishes you so that you may take heed.’ (16: 90) Uthman says: ‘It was then that I felt faith taking hold of my heart and I loved Muhammad.’” (Related by Al-Bukhari in Al-Adab Al-Mufrad and Ahmad).
Perhaps we should say a word about the man at the center of this Hadith, Uthman ibn Mathoon. Apparently this was in the very early days of Islam, because Uthman was the fourteenth person to accept Islam. He says that he only accepted Islam because he was too shy to refuse, after the Prophet had spoken to him about it several times. But only when this verse was revealed that he felt a strong desire to become a Muslim. He also says that he read this verse to Al-Waleed ibn Al-Mugheerah, one of the Quraysh elders, and he commented on the Qur’an, saying: “It is certainly beautiful; it flows so easily. It is like a tree with fruit at the top and goodness at the bottom, and it is in no way the speech of human beings.” Abu Jahl also said: “God certainly enjoins the best of principles.”
The fact that the Prophet spoke to Uthman ibn Mathoon more than once, inviting him to become a Muslim, suggests that the Prophet recognized in him some very fine qualities. In fact his companionship with the Prophet bears that well. He remained very close to the Prophet who valued his companionship highly. Uthman emigrated to Madinah with the Prophet and he was the first of the Muhajireen, i.e. the Muslims of Makkah, to die in Madinah. As he was lying before his burial, the Prophet kissed his forehead and his eyes were tearful. Indeed when Ibraheem, the Prophet’s son, died in his childhood, the Prophet said to him: “Join our good early companion, Uthman ibn Mathoon.”
There is no doubt that Uthman ibn Mathoon was a man of fine character and good qualities. This is why the Prophet was keen that he should accept Islam. The fact that this verse was the immediate cause of his belief testifies to his good character. Let us now look at this verse and the message it gives. Commenting on it, Sayyid Qutb writes:
This book, the Qur’an, has been revealed in order to bring a nation into existence, and to regulate a community; to establish a different world and initiate a new social order. It represents a world message for all mankind, which does not allow any special allegiance to a tribe, nation or race. Faith is the only bond that unites a community and a nation. It puts forward the principles that ensure unity within the community, security and reassurance for individuals, groups and nations, as well as complete trust that governs all transactions, pledges and promises.
It requires that justice should be established and maintained, because justice ensures a solid and constant basis for all transactions and deals between individuals and communities; a basis subject to no prejudice, preference or favoritism; a basis influenced by no family relationship, wealth or strength; a basis that ensures equal treatment for all and subjects all to the same standards and laws.
Along with justice, the Qur’an urges kindness, which mitigates the strictness of absolute justice. It lays the door open for anyone who wishes to win the heart of an opponent to forgo part of what is rightfully his. This means that the chance is available to all to go beyond strict justice, which is both a right and a duty, to show kindness in order to allow wounds to heal or to win favor.
Kindness has an even broader sense. Every good action is a kindness. The command enjoining kindness includes every type of action and transaction. It thus covers every aspect of life, including a person’s relationships with his Lord, family, community and with the rest of mankind.
Perhaps we should add here that some commentators on the Qur’an say that “justice” is the obligatory part, while “kindness” is voluntary, but highly encouraged, particularly in as far as matters of worship are concerned. They say that this verse is part of the revelations received by the Prophet in Makkah, when the legal provisions had not yet been outlined. But the way the verse is phrased uses both justice and kindness in their broadest sense. Moreover, from a purely ethical point of view, both are generally applicable principles, not mere legal provisions.
One aspect of kindness is “generosity to one’s kindred”, but it is specially mentioned here in order to emphasize its importance. From the Islamic point of view, this is not based on narrow family loyalty, but on the Islamic principle of common solidarity that moves from the smaller, local circle to the larger social context. The principle is central to the implementation of the Islamic social system.
The verse proceeds to outline three prohibitions in contrast with the three orders with which it begins, stating that God “forbids all that is shameful, and reprehensible conduct, and all transgression.” Under shameful conduct everything that goes beyond the limits of propriety is included, but the term is often used to denote dishonorable assault and indecency. Thus it combines both aggression and transgression. Hence it has become synonymous with shamefulness.
“Reprehensible conduct” refers to any action of which pure, undistorted human nature disapproves. Islam also disapproves of any such conduct because it is the religion of pure and sound human nature. Yet human nature may become distorted, but Islamic law remains constant, pointing to what human nature has been like before distortion creeps into it.
“Transgression” in this context denotes injustice as well as any excess that goes beyond what is right and fair.
No community may survive when it is based on the spread of shameful, reprehensible conduct and transgression. No community allows shameful conduct in all its connotations, and reprehensible actions of all sorts, and transgression with all its consequences and then hopes to flourish. Hence human nature is bound to rebel against these whenever they are allowed to spread in society.
Abdullah ibn Abbas, the Prophet’s (peace be upon him) cousin and learned companion reports: “The Prophet was seated at the front of his house in Makkah when Uthman ibn Mathoon passed by and smiled at the Prophet. The Prophet said to him: ‘Would you like to sit with me?’ He said: ‘Yes.’ As he faced him and was talking to him, the Prophet looked up to the sky with his eyes fixed... Then he told him: ‘The messenger God sends me came to me now while you are sitting with me.’ He asked: ‘What did he say to you?’ He replied: ‘God enjoins justice, kindness, and generosity to one’s kindred; and He forbids all that is shameful, and reprehensible conduct, and all transgression. He admonishes you so that you may take heed.’ (16: 90) Uthman says: ‘It was then that I felt faith taking hold of my heart and I loved Muhammad.’” (Related by Al-Bukhari in Al-Adab Al-Mufrad and Ahmad).
Perhaps we should say a word about the man at the center of this Hadith, Uthman ibn Mathoon. Apparently this was in the very early days of Islam, because Uthman was the fourteenth person to accept Islam. He says that he only accepted Islam because he was too shy to refuse, after the Prophet had spoken to him about it several times. But only when this verse was revealed that he felt a strong desire to become a Muslim. He also says that he read this verse to Al-Waleed ibn Al-Mugheerah, one of the Quraysh elders, and he commented on the Qur’an, saying: “It is certainly beautiful; it flows so easily. It is like a tree with fruit at the top and goodness at the bottom, and it is in no way the speech of human beings.” Abu Jahl also said: “God certainly enjoins the best of principles.”
The fact that the Prophet spoke to Uthman ibn Mathoon more than once, inviting him to become a Muslim, suggests that the Prophet recognized in him some very fine qualities. In fact his companionship with the Prophet bears that well. He remained very close to the Prophet who valued his companionship highly. Uthman emigrated to Madinah with the Prophet and he was the first of the Muhajireen, i.e. the Muslims of Makkah, to die in Madinah. As he was lying before his burial, the Prophet kissed his forehead and his eyes were tearful. Indeed when Ibraheem, the Prophet’s son, died in his childhood, the Prophet said to him: “Join our good early companion, Uthman ibn Mathoon.”
There is no doubt that Uthman ibn Mathoon was a man of fine character and good qualities. This is why the Prophet was keen that he should accept Islam. The fact that this verse was the immediate cause of his belief testifies to his good character. Let us now look at this verse and the message it gives. Commenting on it, Sayyid Qutb writes:
This book, the Qur’an, has been revealed in order to bring a nation into existence, and to regulate a community; to establish a different world and initiate a new social order. It represents a world message for all mankind, which does not allow any special allegiance to a tribe, nation or race. Faith is the only bond that unites a community and a nation. It puts forward the principles that ensure unity within the community, security and reassurance for individuals, groups and nations, as well as complete trust that governs all transactions, pledges and promises.
It requires that justice should be established and maintained, because justice ensures a solid and constant basis for all transactions and deals between individuals and communities; a basis subject to no prejudice, preference or favoritism; a basis influenced by no family relationship, wealth or strength; a basis that ensures equal treatment for all and subjects all to the same standards and laws.
Along with justice, the Qur’an urges kindness, which mitigates the strictness of absolute justice. It lays the door open for anyone who wishes to win the heart of an opponent to forgo part of what is rightfully his. This means that the chance is available to all to go beyond strict justice, which is both a right and a duty, to show kindness in order to allow wounds to heal or to win favor.
Kindness has an even broader sense. Every good action is a kindness. The command enjoining kindness includes every type of action and transaction. It thus covers every aspect of life, including a person’s relationships with his Lord, family, community and with the rest of mankind.
Perhaps we should add here that some commentators on the Qur’an say that “justice” is the obligatory part, while “kindness” is voluntary, but highly encouraged, particularly in as far as matters of worship are concerned. They say that this verse is part of the revelations received by the Prophet in Makkah, when the legal provisions had not yet been outlined. But the way the verse is phrased uses both justice and kindness in their broadest sense. Moreover, from a purely ethical point of view, both are generally applicable principles, not mere legal provisions.
One aspect of kindness is “generosity to one’s kindred”, but it is specially mentioned here in order to emphasize its importance. From the Islamic point of view, this is not based on narrow family loyalty, but on the Islamic principle of common solidarity that moves from the smaller, local circle to the larger social context. The principle is central to the implementation of the Islamic social system.
The verse proceeds to outline three prohibitions in contrast with the three orders with which it begins, stating that God “forbids all that is shameful, and reprehensible conduct, and all transgression.” Under shameful conduct everything that goes beyond the limits of propriety is included, but the term is often used to denote dishonorable assault and indecency. Thus it combines both aggression and transgression. Hence it has become synonymous with shamefulness.
“Reprehensible conduct” refers to any action of which pure, undistorted human nature disapproves. Islam also disapproves of any such conduct because it is the religion of pure and sound human nature. Yet human nature may become distorted, but Islamic law remains constant, pointing to what human nature has been like before distortion creeps into it.
“Transgression” in this context denotes injustice as well as any excess that goes beyond what is right and fair.
No community may survive when it is based on the spread of shameful, reprehensible conduct and transgression. No community allows shameful conduct in all its connotations, and reprehensible actions of all sorts, and transgression with all its consequences and then hopes to flourish. Hence human nature is bound to rebel against these whenever they are allowed to spread in society.
15.5.09
An Islamic Perspective on the Wealth of Nations
a Paper Delivered at the International Conference on
"Comprehensive Development of Muslim Countries:
An Interdisciplinary Approach from an Islamic Perspective"
An Islamic Perspective on the Wealth of Nations
By: Imad A. Ahmad
Minaret of Freedom Institute, 4323 Rosedale Avenue
Bethesda, Maryland 20814, (301) 656-4717
0. INTRODUCTION
From the Islamic perspective, economic policy must satisfy both the legal requirements of the sharî`ah and the hard cold facts of economic science. Both come from the will of the Allah. As in the case of physical science (see Ahmad 1992), any perceived conflict between them means that either the sharî`ah or the economic facts of life have been misunderstood.
This paper deals not with Adam Smith's book the Wealth of Nations, although much of Smith's analysis is consistent with what I say here and, as I shall note, Smith to large degree was simply picking up where Ibn Khaldun left off. Our main concern is with the politico-economic policies that account for why some nations are wealthier than others and why nations, or dynasties, may be wealthy at one phase of their existence and poor at others. I recently completed a study which demonstrates this principle through an overview of the rise of Islamic economies of the classical Muslim era under the influence of the Qur'an and sunnah and a parallel analysis of the development of economic theory in the same period (Ahmad 1993a, 1994). That review demonstrated the validity of the tradition attributed to the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) that the first generation of Muslims adheres most closely to the principles of the religion and each successive generation drifts farther from it. The gradual devolution of Islamic economic practice away from the sharî`ah stands in contrast to the evolution of Islamic economic theory which reached its peak with Ibn Khaldun. Market principles enunciated in the Qu'ran were eventually abandoned by Muslim society, leading to its inevitable collapse. As the Islamic classical era neared its end, Ibn Khaldun, inventor of modern sociology, identified the economic policies that lead to the rise and fall of dynasties. By that time, reform based on evolving understanding was abandoned (called the closing of the door to ijtihâd) and the Muslim world began its decline into intellectual darkness and economic stagnation. Economic development and technical innovation was taken over by Western civilization, where an analogous departure of practice from theory is now being felt. The knowledge that Ibn Khaldun enunciated went neglected or misunderstood by Muslim society, while the principles that he and his Islamic predecessors identified found their way into Western economic theory on the wealth of nations. In this paper I shall elucidate the specific implications of my analysis for modern economic policy.
The framework of our analysis is the sharî`ah. Islam is, politically, a nomocracy, that is, a system of rule of law (Ahmad 1993b). It is not, as the Western press is wont to misrepresent it, a theocracy, that is a rule by clerics. The concept of theocracy violates the fundamental premise of Islam--that there is none worthy of worship but God. In the Islamic world-view, each human being is directly responsible to the Almighty. The issue of what is it that God commands has been answered in writing, in the Qur'an. It is the unchanging sharî`ah itself, and not some human being or assembly, that man must obey. The nomocratic nature of Islam cannot be overstated. If there were ever a human being who could make a demand of obedience upon the Muslims it would have to be the Prophet himself, yet of him the Qur'an directs only obedience "in any just matter" (see, e.g., 60:12) and in it God warned the Prophet "nor art thou set over them to dispose of their affairs" (39:41). No human being after the Prophet could ask for more allegiance than that due to the Prophet himself. The early caliphs did not do so. Abu Bakr's inaugural address reflects an attitude in sharp contrast to that of political leaders before him: "Now it is beyond doubt that I have been elected your Amir, although I am not better than you. Help me, if I am right; set me right if I am in the wrong; truth is a trust; falsehood a treason.... Obey me as long as I obey Allah and His Prophet; when I disobey Allah and His Prophet, then obey me not." (Siddiqi, pp. 46-47).
The Qur'an recognizes man as a being at once rational, volitional, acquisitive, and ethical. Being primarily a book of moral guidance, the Qur'an advises man that it is in his best interest to pursue a moderate course. That is, man should act to provide for existence on this material plane without sacrificing his moral sensibilities. The Qur'an insists on the harmony of man's spiritual and material interests. It is guidance on how to achieve success "in this life and the next." The Qur'an maintains that its dos and don'ts are not aimed at putting man through a period of earthly misery before he reaps heavenly salvation, but that they are rather the tonic for earthly trials, with some earthly rewards and unlimited heavenly ones as well.
The economic perspective found in the Qur'an has been summarized in a number of places (e.g., Mannan 1970 and Ahmad 1986). The key element of the Qur'an from the economic point of view is its stress on moderation (see, e.g., verses 7:31-32, 18:46 and 17:29). Consumption is permitted ("O ye people! eat of what is on earth lawful and good...." 2:168) while niggardliness (35:29), wastefulness (6:141) and extravagance (17:27) are condemned. The desire for a livelihood (4:5), for comfort (42:36), even for ornament and adornment (18:46) or protection from future uncertainty (4:9) in this world is never called evil. Instead the Qur'an insists that its precepts are the means for achieving success in these things without trading it in for failure in the life to come. The Qur'an "not only permits the Muslims to disperse in the earth and earn their livelihood after Friday prayers (62:10) but also advises the holy Prophet to cut short the morning prayers in order that economic activity is also not hampered (73:20). It also allows its followers to continue their trade during their journey for Hajj (2:198). Along with these incentives to earn, it repeatedly asks man to satisfy his wants and demonstrate his prosperity (4:37, 82:20), without going to the extent of ostentatious extravagance" (uz-Zaman 1981). The only line drawn is overspending (isrâf) which is prohibited even in charity (17:29).
The Qur'an deals with a number of specific economic issues. Private property is protected (2:188). The fulfillment of obligations is commanded (2:177;5:1) and is accompanied by details of contract law (e.g., 2:282-283). There is a prohibition of fraud (26:181) and a call for the establishment of clear standards of weights and measures (55:9).
The Qur'an upholds the principle and sanctity of private property in general--modifying it only in certain details. The modifications to which I refer include such things as establishing women's full rights to private property and the abolition of primogeniture (granting to relatives other than the eldest son, including women a share in the inheritance), obligating Muslims to grant to the poor and needy a share in their wealth, etc. Any Muslim who followed the explicit rules of the Qur'an could not be denied his property without his consent. The Prophet said so explicitly in his farewell pilgrimage: "Nothing shall be legitimate to a Muslim which belongs to a fellow Muslim unless it was given freely and willingly" (Haykal 1976, p. 487).
We shall now discuss how these principles apply to particular issues of primary importance in guiding economy policies of Muslim economies in the modern world: decentralization and preference for private property; requirement of a hard currency monetary policy; limits on taxation; and limits on the domain of the public sector. I shall state the specific policy recommendations for optimal development that follow from the analysis in each of these areas.
1. DECENTRALIZATION AND THE PREFERENCE FOR PRIVATE PROPERTY
My research (Ahmad 1993a, 1994) established that Abu Bakr followed the Prophet's sunnah to the letter. In the Prophet's time three methods of land title were known: individual ownership, communal ownership, and state ownership. The Qur'an neither advocated nor rejected any of these. The Prophet made use of, and thus legitimized, all three of these. However, he showed a preference for decentralization. In Medina he not only confirmed the existing individual ownership, but granted allotments for residences and farms to those who could make use of them. The state held only those lands needed for state purposes, and any property taken for state use was paid for. Communal usage was also defended, as in the prohibition of burning bushes within 12 miles or hunting within 4 miles of Medina, evidently aimed at protecting communal grazing. The Prophet limited "communal" property to three cases: water, grazing, and fire.
As the Muslim community came into possession of a dazzling quantity of lands under Umar, new challenges were confronted. Umar disliked the prospect of taking away these enormous tracts from the conquered people and giving them to the relatively few Muslim soldiers. While such an action might appear, on the surface, to follow the practice of the Prophet, it would violate the spirit of decentralization that had been its foundation. When the victorious soldiers demanded that Umar distribute the conquered lands among them, Umar met with his cabinet and devised the following solution: Noting that the previous owners of the land had paid a land-tax to their Persian overlords, he decreed the following resolution:
1) land covered by peace treaties belonged outright to the former owners, with no taxes except as specified in the treaties;
2) privately-owned land conquered by force would be turned over to the former owners with their property rights restored, provided they agreed to pay a vastly reduced (typically by two-thirds) land-tax, called kharâj, to the Muslim state;
3) unoccupied lands, wasteland, and Sasanian crown lands (as well as lands abandoned by the aristocracy) became the property of the state; part of these became the Muslim equivalent of crown lands, with sale prohibited (fay'), while another part was made available for homesteading on a usufruct basis, that is, in exchange for kharâj payment, provided the land was put to use within three years.
What are the implications of Umar's decree for Islamic economic policy? In particular, what was the purpose of the immobilization of the Sawad lands?
Some scholars (e.g., uz-Zuman 1981) seem to be under the impression that Umar denied right of sale of any lands on which kharâj was paid (which would in effect make them state property rented to the tenants), supposedly to prevent the wealthy conquerors from buying out the property rights of the native people and instituting a feudal society. This view has been refuted by those (e.g., Morony 1981, in Udovitch 1981) who have shown that such acts actually seem to have arisen in the Umayyad period. Their attribution to Umar was an invention that served to justify that dynasty's departure from the sunnah of Muhammad and Abu Bakr. In fact, the prohibition of sale of kharâj-land to Muslims only emerged after 100/718-19 (Lambton 1953, p. 53). The evident purpose "was to maintain the kharâj status of the land through the fiction of communal or state ownership. Islamic legal scholars like Mâwardî ultimately reached a position that while the property in the Sawad could not be sold, the enjoyment of such property could be sold," according to Morony (1981), who further claims Umar II's policy was a special policy not intended to be applied outside Sawad. Thus, the implication that Umar deviated from the sunnah seem unjustified, and the innovations attributed to him were probably introduced by the Umayyads.
Only through zealous protection of the property rights of the people (both their private property and the environment) can society spontaneously develop the optimal division of labor that characterizes productive economies. While earlier Islamic scholars, like Ibn Taymiyah, took the legitimacy of property for granted, Ibn Khaldun pointed out its scientific necessity for a prosperous society. He quotes from Al-Mas`udi report of Môbedhân's speech before Bahrâm: "Men persist only with the help of property. The only way to property is through cultivation [lit. `imârah]. The only way to cultivation is through justice" (Ibn Khaldun 1967, v. I, p. 64). Wehr (1976) translates `imârah as "building, edifice, structure" or "real estate, tract lot." From the context it seems we should take cultivation as development in its widest sense, not restricted to agricultural activity. This fits in with Ibn Khaldun's (1967, v. I, p. 80) assertion that four things make man unique: crafts and science; the need for "restraining influence and authority"; earning a living; and civilization. He emphasizes the need for human cooperation and social organization, for without it, "God's desire to settle the world with human beings and to leave them as His representatives on earth would not materialize" (Ibid., p. 91).
The idea that property is a consequence of development does not differ from--and anticipates--Locke's notion that use establishes the right of property. We find in Ibn Khaldun the economic concepts which appear in a rudimentary form in earlier Muslim writers have acquired a sharp definition. His analysis of the issue of the need for social cooperation stands up to Adam Smith's discussion three centuries later:
[T]he individual human being cannot by himself obtain all the necessities of life. All human beings must cooperate to that end in their civilization. But what is obtained through the cooperation of a group of human beings satisfies the need of a number many times greater (than themselves). For instance, no one by himself, can obtain the share of wheat he needs for food. But when six or ten persons, including a smith and a carpenter to make the tools, and others who are in charge of the oxen, the plowing of the soil, the harvesting of the ripe grain, and all other agricultural activities, undertake to obtain their food and work toward that purpose either separately or collectively and thus obtain through their labor a certain amount of food, (that amount) will be food for a number of people many times their own. The combined labor produces more than the needs and necessities of the workers. (Ibid., p. 272).
The function of political authority is to defend the stability of the social organization against aggression and injustice for "when civilization has thus become a fact, people need someone to exercise a restraining influence and keep then apart, for aggressiveness and injustice are in the animal nature of man" (Ibid.). It is only for this reason that someone must have authority over others, "so that no one of them will be able to attack another. This is the meaning of royal authority" (Ibid., p. 92). Ibn Khaldun ridiculed the claim of the philosophers that the ruler is necessarily one endowed by divine guidance for the exercise of the restraining influence of the religious law by noting that the majority of people have political communities without revealed guidance (Ibid., p. 93).
According to Ibn Khaldun there is only one effective method for government to increase its revenues, and that is "through the equitable treatment of people and property and regard for them" so that "they have the incentive to make their capital bear fruit and grow." His bottom line is found in the section title "Injustice brings about the ruin of civilization" (Ibn Khaldun 1967, v. II, p. 103):
It should be known that attacks on people's property remove the incentive to acquire and gain property. People then become of the opinion that the purpose and ultimate destiny of (acquiring property) is to have it taken away from them. When the incentive to acquire and obtain property is gone, people no longer make efforts to acquire any. The extent and degree to which property rights are infringed upon determines the extent and degree to which the efforts of the subjects to acquire property slacken.... Civilization and its well-being depend on productivity and people's efforts in all directions in their own interests and profit. (Ibid., p. 104)
Once a government has lost popular support, it is sustained by force.
Even though coercion makes its appearance at that time [the later years of a dynasty] and the revenues decrease, the destructive influences of this situation will become noticeable only after some time, because things in nature all have a gradual development.
In the later (years) of dynasties, famines and pestilences become numerous. As far as famines are concerned, the reason is that most people at that time refrain from cultivating the soil. For, in the later (years) of dynasties, there occur attacks on property and tax revenue and, through customs duties, on trading. (Ibid., pp. 135-136)
Ibn Khaldun leaves no room for uncertainty as to his definition of injustice:
Whoever takes someone's property, or uses him for forced labor, or presses an unjustified claim against him, or imposes upon him a duty not required by the religious law, does an injustice to that particular person. People who collect unjustified taxes commit an injustice. Those who infringe upon property rights commit an injustice.... (ibid., p. 107)
Muhammad (peace be upon him) forbade injustice because the purpose of the law is the preservation of civilization, that is, "(1) of the religion, (2) the soul (life), (3) the intellect, (4) progeny, and (5) property (Ibid., p. 107)." Decentralization of ownership of the resources down to the level of the individual, protected by a system of well-defined private property rights including the internalization of costs incurred by environmental impact must then be the first concern of any Islamic government towards the end of an economically successful society.
2. REQUIREMENT OF A HARD CURRENCY MONETARY POLICY
The oft-debated question of interest is only sub-issue of the more general matter of monetary policy. It is disturbing that modern Muslim economists have overlooked the fact that a sound money is an indispensable pre-requisite for a sound economy. Although Umar found the issue of ribâ problematical, the necessity of sound money was universally accepted not only by the Prophet and the righteous caliphs, but by every Muslim government in the early centuries of Islamic civilization. The example of the Prophet himself, who never resorted to clipping, debasing, or the issuance of unbacked paper currency, was generally followed by the Islamic society until about the year 1000. Like the Prophet, the society favored the three monetary commodities most appropriate for use as hard currency in Arabia at that time: gold, silver, and hard wheat. The righteous caliphs followed this principle without exception, and it remained the general rule until the Islamic civilization began to unravel at the turn of the millennium.
Significant departures from this principle began to appear only after the tenth century (Cahen 1981, p. 318). In 1294, the vizier of the Ilkhan Gaikhatu sought to deal with the deficit spending of his day by issuing "paper money, modeled on the Chinese paper currency. The experiment was a complete failure, as the people refused to accept the banknotes. Economic activities came to a standstill, and the Persian historian Rashid ud-din speaks even of 'the ruin of Basra' which ensued upon the emission of the new money" (Ashtor 1976, p. 257).
The door to debasement opened in the next century when the silver to gold exchange rate suffered its first serious change since the rise of Islam. In the early centuries of Islam the rate had always been around 20:1. In the thirteenth century changes in the market led scholars to speculate that the rate had changed to 10:1, but the official rate remained fixed at 20:1. "The stocks of silver in the mints decreased progressively from about 1380.... Whereas the exchange rate of the dirham had for 130 years been 1/20 dinar, that of the debased dirham was 1/25 and later 1/30 dinar" (Ashtor 1976, p. 305). The "main reason was the increased demand in Italy, where the value of silver had risen considerably at the end of the fourteenth century.... At the beginning of the fifteenth century the striking of silver dirhams was discontinued altogether" (Ibid.) Al-Mikrizi blames a high court dignitary who tried to "enrich himself by the striking of copper coins" (Ibid.). The monetary crisis was accompanied by famine and a lengthy civil war. High taxes were levied to equip the armies against repeated revolts.
Interest rates rose from 4-8% during the crusades to 18-25% in the fifteenth century (Ibid., p. 324). Although "the supply of gold from the Western Sudan was never interrupted," Sultan Barsbay in 1425 devalued the dinar "for the first time in the history of the Muslim Near East" (Ibid.). Until then the dinar had always been a gold coin of approximately 4.25 grams. With the devaluation a 3.45 gram dinar called al-Ashrafi "remained the gold coin of Egypt until the end of Mamluk rule" (Ibid.). This was the weight of the European ducat, evidence for the swing in monetary standards away from the Muslim world to the rising Christian West.
A discussion of ribâ and interest can only be meaningful within the framework of the more general issue of monetary policy (see Appendix). The main component of the nominal as opposed to real) rate of interest in modern economies is the anticipated rate of inflation and that, in economies using paper currency, this rate is dominated by government's tendency to debase the money supply. Most of the nominal interest could be eliminated by using sound currency, and a study of the legality of interest can center around any residual. Such an analysis, given in a paper before the American Muslim Social Scientists, is presented in Appendix to this paper. Its principle policy conclusion is that a prohibition on all interest may come at the expense of a decrease in the most revolutionary forms of development. This is because profit sharing cannot induce anyone to invest in an enterprise so radically innovative that only its originator can see foresee its impact and profitability. Nevertheless, most capital investment needs can be met by profit-sharing mechanisms. In any case sound monetary policy is a pre-requisite for sustainable comprehensive development. Hard money is the sunnah method for establishing sound money through the natural process of the market.
3. LIMITS ON TAXATION
Taxation is the most direct means of government intervention into the economy, and usually the first resorted to. The Qur'an names only four sources of public revenues: zakât, sadaqa, jizyah, and khums. The first is an obligation of Muslims only. It is actually a religious obligation rather than an ordinary tax. Sadaqa is purely voluntary and thus is not a tax at all in the usual sense of the term. Jizya is levied on non-Muslims only in lieu of military service and may be set by treaty. The practice of the early Muslims make it clear that it was a fee for protection of the minorities, reimbursable when the protection could not be rendered, and thus it falls in that category of taxes called user fees. Only the khums is taken purely by force, but as it is taken from the enemy in battle, it is not a tax on the citizens, but a share of the spoils of war. In the Prophet's time the khums was given to the Prophet for use at his discretion both for his personal and family needs as well as for disbursements to the poor and needy and public works. One can interpret this as state property out of which the ruler may take a share or as private property of the commander-in-chief out of which he is expected to give sadaqa. In the former case it is a tax on booty rather than on persons. In the latter case, the required public expenditures constitute a tax on the commander-in-chief and not on the general public.
On this account, it appears that taxation authorized by the Qur'an is strictly limited. This is as we should expect, based on the Prophet's hadith that one should not take the property of another Muslim without his consent. The sunnah supports this view. In the time of Muhammad and Abu Bakr, there was no other source of public revenue beyond those authorized by the Qur'an. An alleged exception is found in the claim that the Prophet collected kharâj from the Jews of Khaybar. Siddiqi (1970, p. 17) writes:
When Khaybar was conquered by the Prophet, ... the Jews recognizing the conquerors as the owners of the entire conquered land (after the custom of the day), offered to cultivate the lands as the tenants of the State and paid a part of the produce. The Prophet granted them their request and fixed the Kharaj at half of the produce.
There are two ways to interpret this. Taken at face value the Jews were recognizing the lands as state lands (fay'). In this case the payments constituted rent and not a tax. If, however, the payments were a land-tax, then the rate having been set by treaty constitutes a negotiated jizyah and is still not outside the authorization of the Qur'an.
Thus it is clear that the Prophet never assessed any taxes beyond those specified in the Qur'an except as a user fee. The same is true of Abu Bakr. The general practice of the righteous caliphs supports this analysis. Thus Abû `Abdullâh Mu`âwiya ibn `Ubayd Allâh wrote in a treatise on taxation for the caliph al-Mahdî (Lapidus, 1981):
"all the expenses of digging, including supporting poles, the construction of vaulted passages and bridges, the cleaning up of rivers and the maintenance of post-stations and dams on the great rivers are to be borne by the treasury." Otherwise, however, irrigation canals are evidently considered part of the private domain, and lawyers discuss the questions of water rights and the distribution of irrigation expenses among private persons. They leave the impression that the responsibility of the state was rather limited.
Umar, however, did introduce two new taxes: he imposed tariffs and he expanded the kharâj to cases other than a modified jizyah. Tariffs had been unknown in Arabia. We can imagine Umar's distaste at finding the nations of the world engaged in this form of highway robbery against the merchant who crossed their borders. As the Qur'an authorizes like-kind retaliation against aggression (2:194), he imposed a policy of reciprocity. In an economically savvy effort to minimize the burden of the retaliatory tariffs on Muslims and the dhimmis under their protection, however, he gave a 50% discount to dhimmis and a 75% discount to Muslims.. Further, he counted as a dhimmi for this purpose any non-Muslim whose stay in Muslim lands exceeded one year. It is ironic that Umar's strategic actions to fight against tariffs have been misinterpreted by some modern Muslim economists as an indication that Umar believed that the state can impose any kind of taxes it wants. It has also been disastrous for the freedom and prosperity of the Muslim ummah.
We have already discussed Umar's use of kharâj in the section on the land issue. We may presume that he saw a similarity between the Persian land tax and the usufruct form of jizyah which the Prophet accepted in the case of the Jews. Since the tax that he levied was so much lower than that assessed by the Persians, we may also presume that both he and his new subjects looked upon the terms as agreeable ones, comparable to terms fixed by treaty. Unfortunately, the kharâj here resembles the Persian land tax (which was called kharâg and from which the term kharâj may stem) more than jizyah precisely because it is not fixed by treaty, but may be altered by the state at its discretion. Umar was concerned about this and is reported to have repeatedly warned his governors not to set the rates oppressively high. He interrogated the assessors of Sawâd: "Perhaps you assessed the land at a rate which it cannot stand," and they replied, "No, on the contrary, we have assessed it at a rate which it can stand, although if we had assessed a higher rate the land could still stand it" (Ra`ana 1977, p. 93).
When the Umayyads took power the governors repeatedly raised the kharâj until revenues plummeted under the Hajjaj--legendary for his oppressive tax policies. Subsequently the pious Umar II attempted a return to Umar I's tax policies. "The spirit of economic laws is justice (`adl) and generosity (ihsâ)," he declared (uz-Zaman 1981, p. 75). Revenues rebounded. Unfortunately, his successors strayed from his policies. As the Umayyad dynasty came to a close its ruler confessed: "We committed injustice to our subjects and they became disappointed with our justice. They wished to get rid of us. Our tax-payers were overburdened so they deserted us, destroyed our estates, and emptied our treasuries" (Ibid., pp. 75-76). Yazîd III responded to the outcry against public spending by pledging spending and taxing limitations, but it was too late (Ibid., p. 101).
Throughout Islamic history tax policies seesawed as dynasties rose and fell. Studying them, Ibn Khaldun came to his famous conclusion (recently reincarnated as the "Laffer curve") that dynasties obtain large revenues from low tax rates at their beginnings and small revenues from high tax rates at their ends (Ibn Khaldun 1967, v. II, p. 89).
In the twelfth century, the Seldjukids sought to compensate for the loss of revenue from the land-tax by increasing other taxes or imposing new ones. There were a long series of farcical repeals and reimpositions of taxes (uz-Zaman 1981, p. 217). In at least one cases the demand for repeal came from the minbar. As Iraq became increasingly burdened by the taxes--and by government attempts to monopolize important industries, like silk (Ashtor 1976, p. 214)--Iraq lost its capacity for technological innovation. Thus, the chronicles of Ibn al-Djauzi speak "of mills which were turning and grinding grain on the earth without anyone knowing how they were operated," Ibid., p. 219). The infrastructure crumbled throughout the twelfth century and engineers failed in massive projects. A "contemporary Arab chronicler says explicitly that the government services were incapable of repairing the breaches" in dams in Iraq (Ibid., p. 245).
This stagnation took place as European technology was beginning to blossom. "The great industrial enterprises" could no longer "afford experiments which resulted in technological innovations" once the Seldjukids and Ayyubid "princes curtailed freedom of enterprise, established monopolies and imposed heavy taxes on the workshops. This brought about a slow decline of private industry" (Ibid., p. 247).
The Mongols (Ilkhanids) imposed numerous and arbitrary taxes. Ghazan (1295-1304) attempted some reforms like a fixed tax on land, the abolition of "the quartering of soldiers and officials in private houses and he forbade the use of violence in the collection of taxes" (Ibid., p. 250) and also made feudal fiefs hereditary. Any positive effect of these reforms was washed out by the expansion of the feudal system in other respects. Not only prisoners of war, but even clients and retainers were treated as slaves. "According to the law of Ghazan a peasant who had run away from a feudal estate even thirty years earlier was caught and sent back" (Ibid., p. 258). Under these circumstances, Ghazan's policy of offering state lands to those who would cultivate them with grants of tax reductions as incentives, a policy followed by his successors, met with "only partial success" (Ibid.) and after Ghazan a "new downward trend in agricultural production began" (Ibid.).
Mongols increased state lands including confiscation of waqf property. But later, as early as the 1280s, the government initiated land sales. The increasing private estates "took the lead in Irak's agriculture, as to both output and means of cultivation" (Ibid., p. 261). They responded to the drop in grain demand due to depopulation by switching to other crops, notably cotton and fruit trees. After the death of Abu Said (1316-35) civil war ensued. In subsequent dynasties the merciless misgovernment continued.
The Djalairid dynasty was overthrown in 1410 by Kara Yusuf, chieftain of a federation of Turcomen tribes called the Kara Koyunlu. Their dynasty, by contemporary accounts, brought about the most wretched conditions in the history of Iraq (Ibid., p. 268). Uzun Hasan, prince of the Ak Koyunlu conquered Baghdad in 1469, and then most of Persia. Uzun Hasan codified tax practices with the aim of removing their arbitrary nature and also reduced the land tax (Ibid., p. 272). Taxation was still oppressive however. While peasants of Diyar Bakr province were subject to a 20% tax on crops, they were also subject to forced labor and "many other taxes" besides (Ibid., p. 273).
The Turcomans perfected the feudal land system in Iraq. Fiefholders received a perpetual hereditary grant and "administrative and judicial immunity" (Ibid.). Uzun and his successors granted fiefs to the clergy to win their support. When the Ak Koyunlu realized that they were headed down the road of disintegration they tried to take back many of the fiefs and waqf land but were opposed by both the lords and the theologians.
The domestic and foreign trade of Iraq was seriously set back under the Djalairids and the Turcomans and the economy sank into barter (Ibid., p. 274) . Rather than undo the measures driving down so many areas of domestic and foreign trade, the Turcomens increased taxes on trade. The tamgha, for example, which the scholar Nasir ad-Din Tusi advised should be set at 1/240, was levied in Tabriz at 5% in the early 14th century. Uzun Hasan's advisors dissuaded him from abolishing it. Of course, governors and feudal lords were exempt from the taxes (Ibid., p. 275).
Unsurprisingly, the trade route shifted from the Persian Gulf to the Mediterranean (Ibid., p. 277). In addition to the factors discussed above, changing political conditions at the end of the 15th century (deteriorating conditions in Persia, Genoese victories adversely affecting the Venetians, and Mamluk and Mongol conquests all favoring a resurgence of Red Sea trade) forced Venetians to return to trade through Alexandria and Beirut (Ibid., p. 326).
The history of Muslim tax policies demonstrates the validity of Ibn Khaldun's thesis on the rise and fall of dynasties. At the beginning of their power new dynasties are led by men of bedouin inclinations with no taste for luxury. Their spartan existence makes small demands on the body politic and they devote themselves to the proper purpose of government. The success of their rule leads to a thriving urban civilization. The high prosperity for a while permits government diversion of profits into luxuries. By the time the adverse effects (due to hidden costs) of the expansion of government activity into luxury areas is noticeable, it is too late to change for the generation raised in luxury have lost the meritorious attitudes of their ancestors that made effective minimalist government possible. As the dynasty grows old, the beneficiaries of urban civilization and of government largess
have become used to laziness and ease. They are sunk in well-being and luxury. They have entrusted defense of their property and their lives to the governor and ruler who rules them, and to the militia which has the task of guarding them. They find full assurance of safety in the walls that surround them, and the fortifications that protect them. Thy are carefree and trusting, and have ceased to carry weapons. Successive generations have grown up in this way of life. They have become like women and children, who depend upon the master of the house. (Ibid., p. 257)
The dynasty expands its authorities in various ways to try to maintain its luxuriant expenditure policies. In addition to tampering with the currency, there is, of course, taxation. Initially increasing tax rates serves the purpose, but eventually high tax rates have a deleterious effect on productivity. "It should be known that at the beginning of the dynasty, taxation yields a large revenue from small assessments. At the end of a dynasty, taxation yields a small revenue from large assessments" (Ibid., p. 89).
Among the reasons that no capitalist will be able to accumulate limitless wealth is the envy of the government (Ibid.):
... a sedentary person who has a great deal of capital and has acquired a great number of estates and farms and become one of the wealthiest inhabitants of a particular city, who is looked upon as such and lives in great luxury ... competes in this respect with amirs and rulers. The latter become jealous of him. The aggressiveness that is natural to human beings makes them cast their eyes on his possessions. They envy him and try every possible trick to catch him in the net of a government decision to confiscate his property. Government decisions are as a rule unjust, because pure justice is found only in the legal caliphate that lasted only a short while. Muhammad said: "The caliphate after me will last thirty years; then, it will revert to being tyrannic royal authority."
If Muslim states wish to see prospering economies they should reduce the variety and size of taxes. Ideally they should impose only those taxes authorized by the Qur'an and at those rates practiced by the righteous caliphs: zakât on Muslims), jizyah from non-Muslims which may include kharâj. In addition voluntary sadaqah may be accepted for worthwhile purposes and user fees (including kharâj and ushr) assessed for payment for services desired by the public and provided by the state for reasons of expedience. This interpretation of kharâj is supported by the use of the term in the Qur'an (23:72, for example). Also the state would remain entitled to the khums from the spoils of war. All protective tariffs should be dropped except for reciprocal tariffs, and even they should be subject to discounts of 75% for Muslims and 50% for dhimmis. The degree to which states exceed these taxes is at once the degree to which they transgress beyond the sharî`ah and the measure by which they detract from the welfare of the society as a whole by diverting wealth needed for investment into less productive, or destructive pursuits.
4. LIMITS ON THE DOMAIN OF THE PUBLIC SECTOR
The Islamic societies' experiments with government involvement in economic activity track with its gradual downfall. In the time of Umar the state contented itself with matters of defense, the judicial system, weights and measures, and such major public works as irrigation canals which were paid for by the kharâj and `ushr user fees. None of the righteous caliphs sought to engage the state in competition with the private sector, let alone to monopolize any part of it. Umar's involvement in land distribution was aimed at decentralization and the prevention of the rise of a feudalistic system. Even charges that Uthman's administration favored certain groups and individuals comes under the category of corruption rather than monopoly. State intervention in the economy became an increasing problem as the centuries rolled on, however.
In the Umayyad dynasty, Umar II felt that state participation in commerce is a form of unintended abuse of trust: "I am of the view that the ruler should not trade. It is (also) not lawful for the officer to trade in the area of his office (fî sultanihî...), because when he involves himself in trade he inadvertently misuses his office in his interest and to the detriment of others, even if he does not like to do so" (Uz-Zaman 1981, p. 94). He did, however, intervene in cases where the costs of risks were falling to the state: "As I considered over it I found that gain in mining was but particular (khâs) but its harm was general (`âm) so stop people from working in mines" (Ibid.)
After the fall of the Abbasids, the government was not so scrupulous. The devastating effects of the government's intervention into the Egyptian sugar industry has been well-documented by Ashtor (1976, 1981). The rise of the hitherto unknown sugar industry in the Middle East is a testimony to the economic dynamism of Islam and its openness to technical innovation both from the scientific and economic side. The Egyptian sugar industry began its boom in the 11th century:
The sugar industry in Egypt and Syria under the Fatimids had a capitalistic character. The complicated methods of refining the juice of the sugar cane could only be employed in big factories. ... Rich and enterprising industrialists had to make costly efforts to improve methods, the expected profits being the stimulus. Sugar production also enjoyed freedom of enterprise. The attempt to monopolize it made by the odd and whimsical al-Hakim was not repeated" (Ashtor 1976, pp. 199-200).
In the second half of the thirteenth century the number of Egyptian sugar factories boomed as the Mamluk amirs, lured by the demonstrated high profitability, broke with earlier Muslim law and practice to compete against the private entrepreneurs (Ashtor 1981, p. 99ff). In our summary of Ashtor's analysis (Ahmad 1993 a,b) we have shown in sufficient detail how such expansion of the public sector into the sugar industry led to its downfall, to be replaced by Western producers.
The declining economies caused declining demand. The shift in sources of sugar for Italy can be seen in the tariff records. Early fifteenth century Venetian documents show a shift in the point of origin of molasses for Italy from Egypt to Palermo (Ibid., p. 113). Although the relative abundance of water power for mills in Europe played a factor, the role of government is more significant:
The system of government as it had been developed in the Middle East created conditions that were unfavorable to technological innovations. The feudal lords did not retain their fiefs in perpetuity; since changes were frequently made, they had little interest in building new factories. The musâdara system was a sword of Damocles poised over the heads of all the rich or near rich. The mukûs, commercial taxes, were another check to technological development.... Technological progress also depended, to a certain degree, on the structure of industry. Owing to the large share of government in the sugar industry, there was a lack of competition, a tendency towards corruption in the monopolized industries, and a lack of incentive for innovations. (Ibid., p. 119)
Ashtor implicates demographic trends in the downfall of the Egyptian sugar industry (Ibid., p. 120), but governmental policies also affect demographic trends. The increasingly feudalistic land tenure structures had an adverse affect on population patterns. Nizam al-Mulk, in the Book of Politics states that "the peasants, having been impoverished by heavy taxation and extortion, are ruined and dispersed." (See Ashtor 1976).
At the beginning of the fifteenth century most of the monopolized industries (sugar, soap, paper, silk and other fabrics, glass) collapsed. "[A]l-Makrizi writes that after 1404 people were compelled to dress themselves in the woolen stuffs imported by European merchants" (Ibid., p. 307). The role of government factories in the technological decline of Near Eastern industry is unmistakable. With cheaper sources for raw materials (in part produced on the royal estates), the "sultans and amirs used their power to curtail the activities of their competitors by taxation or by the establishment of monopolies. ... The royal factories themselves were ruined by corrupt managers whose maladministration induced the sultans in the course of time to abolish the tiraz system altogether. Industrial production sank to the level of small workshops which could not afford long and costly experiments" (Ibid., p. 308-309).
According to Ibn Khaldun, shipbuilding skills had declined to the point that "in case of need the governments must have recourse to foreign help" (Ibid.). As Muslim skills in, for example, silver inlay vanished, Venetians picked it up from Syrian Jews.
The decline of wheat was a landmark. It had been the staple, but with the arrival of the last decade of the fifteenth century, millet and dhura bread were being consumed in Cairo and barley in Damascus--even by the governor and the princes (Ibid.). With the breakdown and flight to the cities there came thousands of unemployed paupers, victimized by diseases--chronic and epidemic. Desperate, they provided a recruitment pool for warring factions and rebels. "The lowest stratum of this class were the so-called harafish, beggars who were to be found near the mosques and elsewhere and who were allied to certain groups of dervishes" (Ibid., p. 320). Skilled workers were in better shape only because there was such a shortage of them. The petty bourgeois, however, "were impoverished by the fiscal policy of the Mamluk government" (Ibid.).
In addition to the burdens of trade taxes there were numerous other extortions. We have already mentioned the tarh, which compelled merchants to buy overpriced products from their government competitors. Such measures were periodically abolished and then resurrected. Muslim jurisprudence did not allow for price-fixing outside times of emergency, but the Mamluks fixed prices when it suited their interests (Ibid.).
At the same time land-tenure changes gave rise to a feudalist system placing the bourgeois in an inferior position. The legal scholars were also made subservienbt to the state through government appointments to judgeships or teaching positions at schools endowed by the Mamluks, inducing collaboration (Ibid., p. 284). Using a practice resurrected in current-day Egypt, the government avoided responding to the theologians' protests against the governmental extortions, by instead wooing them by such measures as "promulgating decrees against the Christians and Jews" (Ibid., p. 285) Thus an intellectual aristocracy of judges and professors appointed by the government arose. The disfavored classes engaged in mob riots, but no organized revolutionary movement. "[A]ll classes of society were imbued with a spirit of rigid orthodoxy which made a social revolution allied to sectarian tendencies unthinkable" (Ibid., p. 322). Yet, the co-option of the religious scholars pre-empted any jihâd against the oppressive regime.
Despite the consequent favorable balance of payments due to the change of trade routes discussed in the preceding section, and continuing supply of Sudanese gold, "the economy of the Mamluk kingdom crumbled in the second half of the fifteenth century" (Ibid,, p.327). "The flourishing economy of the Near East had been ruined by the rapacious military, and its great civilizing achievements had been destroyed through inability to adopt new methods of production and new ways of life" (Ibid,, p. 331). The economic breakdown led to the political and military collapse. Reasons for breakdown: decay of Egyptian industry; extravagant luxury of the ruling class; hoarding of money (a consequence of musâdara?); and military spending. At the same time Portuguese were expanding and in the second half of the 15th c. Their seizure of "great quantities of Sudanese gold" was felt in Cairo (Ibid., p. 329-330).
Ibn Khaldun analyzed and denounced government competition with the private sector as a means of revenue enhancement. He titles a section of the Muqaddimah "Commercial activity on the part of the ruler is harmful to his subjects and to the tax revenue" (Ibid., p. 93). He elaborates that the ruler has an unfair advantages in (1) using state wealth in competition with private resources; (2) having taxing authority; (3) having ability to force purchases at above market prices; (4) intimidating competition and suppliers to force selling below market (Ibid., p. 94). The consequent "financial difficulties and loss of profit ... takes away all incentive to effort, thus ruining the fiscal (structure)" (Ibid., p. 95). With the merchants and farmers driven out of business, tax revenues dry up and the government has undermined its best source of revenue.
Furthermore, (the trading of the ruler) may cause the destruction of civilization and, through [it] the destruction of the dynasty. When the subjects can no longer make their capital larger through agriculture and commerce, it will decrease and disappear as a result of expenditures. This will ruin their situation. This should be understood. (Ibid., p. 95)
Muslim states which wish to see an industrial revolution should pursue a policy that permits the private sector to engage in any and all halâl pursuits. The primary role the Muslim state is the establishment of justice. Arbitration is better suited to this goal that regulation and licensing. While there are some infrastructure tasks that can be expeditiously handled by the state without jeopardizing or contradicting its primary task, they are few in number and increasing them constitutes a slippery slope to economic failure.
5. CONCLUSIONS
Those who, of their own free will and without any compulsion act according to the Book (Qu'rân) and the News (Hadîth) wear the turban of freedom (Khwaja-i-Jahan Mahmud Gawan quoted by Sherwani 1959).
We conclude by showing the implications for comprehensive development of Muslim countries in the modern era. A proper mindset for understanding what economic policy can and cannot do is aided by always remembering that bay`ah is a contract between the rulers and the people. Ibn Khaldun (Ibid., p. 429) notes that the scholar "Mâlik pronounced the legal decision that a declaration obtained by compulsion was invalid..." for which he was persecuted. We can sense his distaste when he notes that in his own day the shaking the leader's hand had been replaced by "greeting kings by kissing the earth (in front of them), or their hand, their foot, or the lower hem of their garment" (Ibid.).
The list of the proper functions of government is a short one: (Ibid., v. II, p. 3):
1) "defend and protect the community from its enemies."
2) "enforce restraining laws among the people, in order to prevent mutual hostility and attacks upon property. This includes improving the safety of the roads."
3) "cause the people to act in their own best interests, and ... supervise such general matters involving their livelihood and mutual dealings as foodstuffs and weights and measures, in order to prevent cheating."
4) oversee the mint to prevent fraud in currency.
5) Exercise political leadership.
Items 2-5 are distinctly economic in purpose. It is interesting that item 4 permits private minting which was in fact the early Muslim practice. Ibn Khaldun comments (Ibid., p. 55): "The government paid no attention to the matter. As a result, the frauds practiced with dinars and dirhams eventually became very serious" in the year 74 A. H. or 75 A. H. Thus in 76 (695-696 C. E.) Abd-al-Malik standardized the dirham with the emblem "God is one, God is the samad."
F. A. Hayek (1967) attributed to David Hume the "invention" that in its positive aims government was entitled to "no power of coercion and was subject to the same general and inflexible rules which aim at an overall order by creating its negative conditions: peace, liberty, and justice." Centuries before Hume was born, however, the applicability of sharî`ah to government was a seminal concept in Islam. The claim that Islamic society was governed more by situation ethics (see, e.g., Talbi 1981) than by the Qur'an and sunnah contains some truth, but is misleading. Muslim society strayed away from these principles gradually. Initially by constraints on land distribution and expansion of taxation, later in government interference in the economy, and finally in the loss of respect for private property and individual liberty. But until the thirteenth century, Muslim scholars, largely independent of the government, continued to develop a fiqh grounded in the Qur'an and sunnah as they understood it (Ahmad 1993a, 1994). It was only with the closing of the door to ijtihâd that actual practice substituted for the standards of the divine law. Islamic society paid the price for it.
Muslim scholars who interpret early Muslim practice as a precedent for whatever intervention in which a modern state wishes to engage do so only by ignoring the clear text of the Qur'an and dropping the context of the Prophet's advisory in the farewell pilgrimage. The best hope for an Islamic renaissance is to return to the fundamentals of Islam, i.e., the Qur'an and the principles exemplified by the practice of the Prophet. They do the ummah a disservice. Muslim nations eager for economic development should neither imitate the majoritarian policies of developed countries entering into the declining phases of their economic success nor should they retain authoritarian policies which account for their current stagnation. Rather, they should emulate the policies which permitted industrial development to occur in the first place. And what nascent society would be better to emulate than the Islamic society at the outset of its golden era? The implications for economic policy are clear:
1) Define and defend the property rights of the people, which should be as expansive as possible;
2) Issue a currency fully backed by hard monetary commodities;
3) Restrict public revenues to sources authorized by the sharî'ah and practiced by the khalifah rashidûn (zakât, jizyah, sadaqa, khums, and justifiable user fees including kharâj and `ushr) and limit them to the lawful limits;
4) End all government interference with economy apart from the prohibition of the initiation of coercion, fraud or other harâm activities.
The implicit limitations on the size and scope of government (as well as its decentralization) can also be a mechanism for the elimination of corruption which is another major problem for economic growth.
APPENDIX:
RIBA AND INTEREST: DEFINITIONS AND IMPLICATIONS
(delivered at 22nd Conference of American Muslim Social Scientists
Oct. 15-17, 1993 in Herndon, VA)
[ABSTRACT: The overwhelming majority of scholars have historically held that all interest falls under the rubric of ribâ, banned by the Qur'an. We argue that neither ribâ nor interest have been well defined in the Islamic literature. If we define ribâ as it is used in the Qur'an and sunnah and define pure interest as the term is used by Böhm-Bawerk, we discover that the terms are not synonymous. We demonstrate that some of the criteria traditionally used to identify ribâ, such as time-element, contradict the sunnah. We conclude that ribâ includes all forms of overcharging, including overcharging on interest (usury). We show that some practices held as harâm by the traditionalists are in fact mandatory in order to avoid ribâ. On the other hand the now common practice of issuing unbacked paper currency, scrupulously avoided by Muslims in the first 400 years of the Hijrah era, constitutes a form of ribâ which puts economies at great risk.]
Most of the scholars who have investigated the issue of ribâ have simply assumed that ribâ and interest are synonymous, and then pointed to the unambiguous denunciation of ribâ in the Qur'an to justify their opposition to all forms of interest. This is a very poor methodology. It trivializes an issue so complex that Umar listed as one of the three matters on which he wished the Prophet (peace upon him) had provided more guidance. My approach shall be to take for granted the prohibition of ribâ as being glaringly evident from the Qur'anic texts (3:130;2:275-279) and seek to establish what the word means. We shall then compare this concept against the concepts of interest, usury, and overcharging, and argue that the latter two are, depending on the context, better translations of the term ribâ than interest.
Semantically ribâ means an excess or an addition. The context of the discussion of ribâ in the Qur'an makes four things (besides its prohibition) abundantly clear: (1) that it involves amounts which are in some sense large; (2) that its distinction from legitimate trade is so obvious that only a madman could confuse the two; (3) that it may be contrasted to charity; (4) that it is unjust. It is critical to notice that the principle exposition on the subject of ribâ occurs in the middle of a passage on charity (in Surat-al-baqara):
(267) O ye who believe! Give of the good things which ye have (honourably) earned, and of the fruits of the earth which We have produced for you, and do not even aim at getting anything which is bad, in order that out of it ye may give away something, when ye yourselves would not receive it except with closed eyes. And know that God is free of all wants, and worthy of all praise.
(268) The Evil One threatens you with poverty and bids you to conduct unseemly. God promiseth you His forgiveness and bounties. And God careth for all and He knoweth all things.
(269) He granteth wisdom to whom He pleaseth; and he to whom wisdom is granted receiveth Indeed a benefit overflowing; but none will grasp the Message but men of understanding.
(270) And whatever ye spend in charity or devotion, be sure God knows it all. But the wrong-doers have no helpers.
(271) If ye disclose (acts of) charity, even so it is well, but if ye conceal them, and make them reach those (really) in need, that is best for you: It will remove from you some of your (stains of) evil. And God Is well acquainted with what ye do.
(272) It is not required of thee (O Apostle), to set them on the right path, but God sets on the right path whom He pleaseth. Whatever of good ye give benefits your own souls, and ye shall only do so seeking the "face" of God. Whatever good ye give, shall be rendered back to you, and ye shall not be dealt with unjustly.
(273) (Charity is) for those in need, who, in God's cause are restricted (from travel), and cannot move about in the land, seeking (for trade or work): the ignorant man thinks, because of their modesty, that they are free from want. Thou shalt know them by their (unfailing) mark: they beg not importunately from all and sundry. and whatever of good ye give, be assured God knoweth it well.
(274) Those who (in charity) spend of their goods by night and by day, in secret and in public, have their reward with their lord: on them shall be no fear, nor shall they grieve.
(275) Those who devour usury will not stand except as stands one whom the Evil One by his touch hath driven to madness. That is because they say: "trade is like usury," but God hath permitted trade and forbidden usury. Those who after receiving direction from their lord, desist, shall be pardoned for the past; their case is for God (to judge); but those who repeat (the offence) are companions of the fire: they will abide therein (for ever).
(276) God will deprive usury of all blessing, but will give increase for deeds of charity: for he loveth not creatures ungrateful and wicked.
(277) Those who believe, and do deeds of righteousness, and establish regular prayers and regular charity, will have their reward with their lord: on them shall be no fear, nor shall they grieve.
(278) O ye who believe! Fear God, and give up what remains of your demand for usury, if ye are indeed believers.
(279) If ye do it not, take notice of war from God and his apostle: but if ye turn back, ye shall have your capital sums: deal not unjustly, and ye shall not be dealt with unjustly.
(280) If the debtor is in a difficulty, grant him time till it is easy for him to repay. But if ye remit it by way of charity, that is best for you if ye only knew. Interest is a predetermined fixed rate of return. Usury means an excessive interest. Overcharging means an excessive price of any sort.
In the Prophet's day few loans were for the purpose of raising venture capital. The usual purpose of a loan was to allow persons in deep financial need to make it to next week. Due to the state of extreme need of such borrowers, the rate of interest on these loans tended to be exorbitant ("doubled and multiplied," 3:130), resulting in additional debt to the borrower as the interest charges made him worse off. The context of the quotes above, immediately followed by a fiery denunciation of ribâ and an entreatment to charity makes this circumstance clear (2:275-281). It is thus unsurprising that the early Islamic scholars perceived all commercial interest as usury.
At root of the attacks on interest is the assumption that by one standard or another it is unearned. There is certainly a distinction between the function of the entrepreneur and of the capitalist. The entrepreneur makes decisions, studies markets, takes risks in that his profit is not predetermined, etc. The capitalist does nothing. He is the owner of the money which the entrepreneur uses. (Note that the entrepreneur may also be a capitalist to the degree that he uses his own money, and the capitalist is an entrepreneur to the degree that he makes investment decisions and assumes risks). It is not risk that makes up "pure" interest, for to the extent that risk is involved that may also be considered entrepreneurial profit. The "capitalist" is then actually an "investor" who is then part entrepreneur and part capitalist. But the risk in a long term government bond does not explain the 6% interest rates current as this paper is being written.
Böhm-Bawerk (1959) has shown that the market rate of interest is not an addition to (or excess over) capital value. This is due to the fact that the source of value is the subjective desire of the participants in the market, and it is a fact that, subjectively, people tend to prefer access to their money now rather than in the future. The key here is access to money. It is true that there are numerous circumstances under which I would want to store my money for future use: a child's education, retirement, a nest egg against emergencies, etc. But even in these cases, I would prefer to have the right to get my principle on demand in case I change my mind. Thus there is a difference between demand deposits and time deposits. In the former case I have given up nothing, and it will indeed be an excess (ribâ) to collect interest. In the latter case, the present value of money inaccessible until a set future time is less than the present value of the same money with no such constraint. This time-preference means that a person considering a time-deposit is being offered a diminution of the subjective value of capital unless a compensatory interest is also offered. Those for whom the market rate of interest exceeds this value difference would be making a profit, but those for whom it is less will be taking a loss. Forcing someone to accept less than the market rate would thus constitute a diminution of the capital sum, a violation of the Qur'anic explication of the terms of the Qur'anic prohibition of ribâ: "but if ye turn back [i.e., abandon ribâ] ye shall have your capital sums; deal not unjustly and ye shall not be dealt with unjustly" (2:279). Thus we see the reason that discounts for cash and surcharges for credit, agreed to between vendor and buyer, have always been permitted by Islamic law.
How does interest on a loan issued by a third party differ from the discount for cash or surcharge for credit? From an economic point of view it does not, except that it adds greater flexibility to the market. Consider the case in which a buyer is willing to pay $2100 next year for a used car but the seller wants $2000 right now. A deal is impossible. But if a third party agrees to lend $2000 to the buyer in exchange for $2100 a year from now, the buyer is happy, the seller is happy, and the lender is happy. Prohibiting such a transaction serves no purpose. Islamic scholars who maintain that all interest is usurious are in the position of claiming that although it would be permissible for the buyer to pay $2000 now, or for the seller to accept $2100 next year, it prohibited for the lender to make both of these possible at the same time.
Abu-Saud (1986) agrees that such a transaction is not harâm, but distinguishes between it and loans for more general purposes. In the example I have cited the loan is for a specific purchase, with the lender as a clear substitute for the buyer in a clearly halâl transaction. Abu-Saud does not believe that the analogy can be further extended to what he calls "charitable debt." Should we consider all "clear cash loans" to be examples of charitable debt? Following the overwhelming majority of scholars, Abu-Saud (1986) argues:
The prohibition of paying an extra amount to the lender of cash is originally based on the fact that money is a "quasi commodity" and has no intrinsic utility, though it serves the purpose of obtaining the utilities of other commodities and goods. Unless its holder uses it, i.e. spends it, it would not give him any economic satisfaction. Thus, Islamicly speaking, if there is a surplus of money in the hands of its owner, it would not, and indeed should not, earn any yield as long as does not exert any effort or undertake any risk. The Islamic principle we should always remember is there is no reward without work and no work without reward.
This argument is erroneous, however, on a number of grounds. In the first place, money commodities like gold do have an "intrinsic" value (one should say use value). Natural monetary commodities, unlike paper currency, evolve a monetary value after being prized initially for their utility. The fact that their monetary utility comes to outweigh their other uses (say in industry or as ornamentation) does not change this fact. Indeed their monetary use only adds to their value. Further, the argument suggests a reliance on the theory of labor value that dominated the thinking of Adam Smith, David Ricardo, and Karl Marx, but which has been demonstrated to be false. Value is not determined by labor, but is subjective. The subjective nature of value leads to numerous consequences in economics, such as marginal utility and time preference. Following the discussion above, it is time preference that brings about a positive rate of interest. Thus the payment of interest is a means of compensating the lender for agreeing to defer payback, which constitutes a loss of value to the lender whom the Qur'an has guaranteed shall suffer no such loss.
The traditional Muslim position has been defended against this type of criticism on the grounds that it is merely the institution of interest that is opposed and not the de facto interest involved in all time-dependent transactions. Given the fungibility of money it seems that a prohibition on the institution of interest is easily circumvented, and there are numerous examples of such circumvention in Islamic history. I propose that there is one very important case where a prohibition on interest is difficult to circumvent, and I suggest that this may be the explanation for the peculiar fact that Islamic world in the classical era never achieved an industrial revolution.
In most cases any proposed fixed interest transaction can be converted into an equivalent (for purposes of marketability) profit-sharing transaction. This is the theory behind the so-called "Islamic banking." There are a few exceptions. Treasury bills, which pay an interest that is not derived from business profits, are a problem, but that problem is gotten around in an Islamic economy by avoiding deficit spending. A more serious problem is reflected in the fact that extremely high risk investments are difficult to finance in the absence of fixed interest. This has been demonstrated by Abdul Aziz (1993) in the case of Islamic economies, but the general principle is obvious in the following hypothetical case. Consider an entrepreneur with an idea so revolutionary that he cannot persuade anyone of its profitability. His offers to various capitalists to permit them a share in profits that they are certain shall be non-existent is fruitless. No profit/loss sharing ratio can be advantageous enough to entice them. Even if he offers them 100% of the profits and none of the losses, they would decline because they would not sacrifice the opportunity costs for what they perceive to be non-existent chance of profit. This would explain why it was the West and not the Muslim world that produced commercial products like electricity and the automobile which were considered laughable ideas by all but the visionaries who brought them to the market.
Let us now return to the definitions of the terms of interest. Most authorities claim that ribâ involves a fixed non zero rate of return for one commodity against a like commodity over time. An examination of the hadith which Abu-Saud (1986) deemed authentic on this subject demonstrates that this interpretation is incorrect on the following grounds. The Prophet (peace be upon him) included in this prohibition certain spot transactions such as the exchange of dates of differing quality unless the exchange was mediated by a market price evaluation of the commodities being exchange. This is traditionally known as ribâ al-Fadhl. Thus we have a kind of ribâ in which no time element exists. Conversely, one can have transactions in which deferred payment with a surcharge for credit is permitted, as we have seen above. Then time element is clearly not the defining element of ribâ.
Then what is the defining element of ribâ? I propose that it is overcharging. This is the element in common in every example given in Qur'an and hadith. The insistence on a market evaluation of the dates in the barter exchange of unlike materials is clearly representative of a concern over overcharging. The same applies to the Prophet's prohibition of brokers' taking unfair advantage of caravans unaware of changes in market prices. A fraudulent misrepresentation of the market price constitutes ribâ:
A man displayed some goods in the market and took a false oath that he had been offered so much for them, though he was not offered that amount. Then the following Divine Verse was revealed: "Verily those who purchase a little gain at the cost of Allah's covenant and their oaths ... will get a painful punishment." (3:77) Ibn Abâ Aufâ added, "Such a person as described above is a treacherous Ribâ-eater (i.e. eater of usury).
When overcharging is applied to fixed rates of interest, it is called usury.
It follows that interest may or may not be usurious, depending upon whether or not the rate charged exceeds the market clearing rate of interest. But when would an agreed-to interest rate exceed the market rate? The answer is clear when we return to the context in which the Qur'an denounces ribâ: namely, when a charitable loan is at issue. It is only the poor and needy, etc. who agree to pay usurious interest rates because of their disadvantaged position in the market place. The Muslim is prohibited not only from charging such rates but from paying them. That is, because such a rates is illegal, lenders who would charge higher rates than they themselves are willing to accept are forced to take market rates. But the context makes clear that in these cases we should give charity instead. This may be in the form of an interest-free loan, or outright sadaqa.
To understand this consider the following case of overcharging to which the principle enunciated in the Qur'anic passages would clearly apply even though there is no time element:
A boatman takes people across the river for one dinar. One day, as he is crossing the river he sees a drowning man calling for help. He tells the drowning man, I will give you a ride, but you must pay me. The drowning man, of course, agrees. The boatman says: the cost will be everything you own plus everything you ever earn from now on. The man is no position to argue, he agrees. The boatman takes him aboard and delivers him to the other side, and demands his payment. The man refuses and offers instead to give him the one dinar standard payment. The boatman drags him before a qâdî and demands payment in full. One would hope that the qâdî would apply the Qur'anic principles and say that the EXCESS (ribâ) charge is harâm, and that while the boatman is entitled to the market value (i.e. one dinar) that in this case charity would be better for him. Such overcharging constitutes ribâ (al-Fadhl) despite the absence of a time element.
Ribâ, as the term is used in the Qur'an, clearly refers to usury. In the hadith it appears to be extended to all forms of overcharging as "having an element of ribâ in them." Such overcharging was made possible by the disadvantaged position of the borrower in the former case and by the withholding of information about market price in the latter case. Discount for cash and surcharge for credit, which are Islamicly permitted are examples of interest and clearly demonstrate that interest and ribâ are not synonymous. Further, there is no distinction between rental for money and rental for non-depreciating land, so that a prohibition of one without a prohibition of the other is a contradiction. Finally, the misidentification of ribâ with interest combined with the common use of unsound currencies permits borrowers to engage in ribâ with impunity. To wit, consider of I wish to borrow a certain quantity from someone which is equal to 100 units of some currency. If interest is prohibited, then I will pay him back in 100 units of this currency one year later. If the currency is sound, he has his principle returned to him (ignoring the fact that I've cheated him of his time preference). But if the currency is unsound, like an Israeli shekel, it may only be worth half of what he loaned me as measured in a sound currency. Now I have robbed him of half the principle, which is undeniably a violation of the Qur'anic injunction.
Of course, if Islamic countries would issue sound currency, then at least this component of ribâ could be removed from time-dependent transactions. The main component of the nominal (as opposed to real) rate of interest in modern economies is the anticipated rate of inflation and that, in economies using paper currency, this rate is dominated by government's tendency to debase the money supply. Neither the Prophet, nor the khulufah rashidûn, nor any other Muslim rulers of the first 400 years of Islam engaged in the fraudulent practice of debasing the money supply, which was a principle reason for the society's dynamism and success [see main paper]. Return to the practice of relying in sound currency would eliminate most nominal interest. Then debates over the legality of interest could center around the small residual which is attributable to time preference.
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[Minaret of Freedom Preprint Series 96-4]
"Comprehensive Development of Muslim Countries:
An Interdisciplinary Approach from an Islamic Perspective"
An Islamic Perspective on the Wealth of Nations
By: Imad A. Ahmad
Minaret of Freedom Institute, 4323 Rosedale Avenue
Bethesda, Maryland 20814, (301) 656-4717
0. INTRODUCTION
From the Islamic perspective, economic policy must satisfy both the legal requirements of the sharî`ah and the hard cold facts of economic science. Both come from the will of the Allah. As in the case of physical science (see Ahmad 1992), any perceived conflict between them means that either the sharî`ah or the economic facts of life have been misunderstood.
This paper deals not with Adam Smith's book the Wealth of Nations, although much of Smith's analysis is consistent with what I say here and, as I shall note, Smith to large degree was simply picking up where Ibn Khaldun left off. Our main concern is with the politico-economic policies that account for why some nations are wealthier than others and why nations, or dynasties, may be wealthy at one phase of their existence and poor at others. I recently completed a study which demonstrates this principle through an overview of the rise of Islamic economies of the classical Muslim era under the influence of the Qur'an and sunnah and a parallel analysis of the development of economic theory in the same period (Ahmad 1993a, 1994). That review demonstrated the validity of the tradition attributed to the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) that the first generation of Muslims adheres most closely to the principles of the religion and each successive generation drifts farther from it. The gradual devolution of Islamic economic practice away from the sharî`ah stands in contrast to the evolution of Islamic economic theory which reached its peak with Ibn Khaldun. Market principles enunciated in the Qu'ran were eventually abandoned by Muslim society, leading to its inevitable collapse. As the Islamic classical era neared its end, Ibn Khaldun, inventor of modern sociology, identified the economic policies that lead to the rise and fall of dynasties. By that time, reform based on evolving understanding was abandoned (called the closing of the door to ijtihâd) and the Muslim world began its decline into intellectual darkness and economic stagnation. Economic development and technical innovation was taken over by Western civilization, where an analogous departure of practice from theory is now being felt. The knowledge that Ibn Khaldun enunciated went neglected or misunderstood by Muslim society, while the principles that he and his Islamic predecessors identified found their way into Western economic theory on the wealth of nations. In this paper I shall elucidate the specific implications of my analysis for modern economic policy.
The framework of our analysis is the sharî`ah. Islam is, politically, a nomocracy, that is, a system of rule of law (Ahmad 1993b). It is not, as the Western press is wont to misrepresent it, a theocracy, that is a rule by clerics. The concept of theocracy violates the fundamental premise of Islam--that there is none worthy of worship but God. In the Islamic world-view, each human being is directly responsible to the Almighty. The issue of what is it that God commands has been answered in writing, in the Qur'an. It is the unchanging sharî`ah itself, and not some human being or assembly, that man must obey. The nomocratic nature of Islam cannot be overstated. If there were ever a human being who could make a demand of obedience upon the Muslims it would have to be the Prophet himself, yet of him the Qur'an directs only obedience "in any just matter" (see, e.g., 60:12) and in it God warned the Prophet "nor art thou set over them to dispose of their affairs" (39:41). No human being after the Prophet could ask for more allegiance than that due to the Prophet himself. The early caliphs did not do so. Abu Bakr's inaugural address reflects an attitude in sharp contrast to that of political leaders before him: "Now it is beyond doubt that I have been elected your Amir, although I am not better than you. Help me, if I am right; set me right if I am in the wrong; truth is a trust; falsehood a treason.... Obey me as long as I obey Allah and His Prophet; when I disobey Allah and His Prophet, then obey me not." (Siddiqi, pp. 46-47).
The Qur'an recognizes man as a being at once rational, volitional, acquisitive, and ethical. Being primarily a book of moral guidance, the Qur'an advises man that it is in his best interest to pursue a moderate course. That is, man should act to provide for existence on this material plane without sacrificing his moral sensibilities. The Qur'an insists on the harmony of man's spiritual and material interests. It is guidance on how to achieve success "in this life and the next." The Qur'an maintains that its dos and don'ts are not aimed at putting man through a period of earthly misery before he reaps heavenly salvation, but that they are rather the tonic for earthly trials, with some earthly rewards and unlimited heavenly ones as well.
The economic perspective found in the Qur'an has been summarized in a number of places (e.g., Mannan 1970 and Ahmad 1986). The key element of the Qur'an from the economic point of view is its stress on moderation (see, e.g., verses 7:31-32, 18:46 and 17:29). Consumption is permitted ("O ye people! eat of what is on earth lawful and good...." 2:168) while niggardliness (35:29), wastefulness (6:141) and extravagance (17:27) are condemned. The desire for a livelihood (4:5), for comfort (42:36), even for ornament and adornment (18:46) or protection from future uncertainty (4:9) in this world is never called evil. Instead the Qur'an insists that its precepts are the means for achieving success in these things without trading it in for failure in the life to come. The Qur'an "not only permits the Muslims to disperse in the earth and earn their livelihood after Friday prayers (62:10) but also advises the holy Prophet to cut short the morning prayers in order that economic activity is also not hampered (73:20). It also allows its followers to continue their trade during their journey for Hajj (2:198). Along with these incentives to earn, it repeatedly asks man to satisfy his wants and demonstrate his prosperity (4:37, 82:20), without going to the extent of ostentatious extravagance" (uz-Zaman 1981). The only line drawn is overspending (isrâf) which is prohibited even in charity (17:29).
The Qur'an deals with a number of specific economic issues. Private property is protected (2:188). The fulfillment of obligations is commanded (2:177;5:1) and is accompanied by details of contract law (e.g., 2:282-283). There is a prohibition of fraud (26:181) and a call for the establishment of clear standards of weights and measures (55:9).
The Qur'an upholds the principle and sanctity of private property in general--modifying it only in certain details. The modifications to which I refer include such things as establishing women's full rights to private property and the abolition of primogeniture (granting to relatives other than the eldest son, including women a share in the inheritance), obligating Muslims to grant to the poor and needy a share in their wealth, etc. Any Muslim who followed the explicit rules of the Qur'an could not be denied his property without his consent. The Prophet said so explicitly in his farewell pilgrimage: "Nothing shall be legitimate to a Muslim which belongs to a fellow Muslim unless it was given freely and willingly" (Haykal 1976, p. 487).
We shall now discuss how these principles apply to particular issues of primary importance in guiding economy policies of Muslim economies in the modern world: decentralization and preference for private property; requirement of a hard currency monetary policy; limits on taxation; and limits on the domain of the public sector. I shall state the specific policy recommendations for optimal development that follow from the analysis in each of these areas.
1. DECENTRALIZATION AND THE PREFERENCE FOR PRIVATE PROPERTY
My research (Ahmad 1993a, 1994) established that Abu Bakr followed the Prophet's sunnah to the letter. In the Prophet's time three methods of land title were known: individual ownership, communal ownership, and state ownership. The Qur'an neither advocated nor rejected any of these. The Prophet made use of, and thus legitimized, all three of these. However, he showed a preference for decentralization. In Medina he not only confirmed the existing individual ownership, but granted allotments for residences and farms to those who could make use of them. The state held only those lands needed for state purposes, and any property taken for state use was paid for. Communal usage was also defended, as in the prohibition of burning bushes within 12 miles or hunting within 4 miles of Medina, evidently aimed at protecting communal grazing. The Prophet limited "communal" property to three cases: water, grazing, and fire.
As the Muslim community came into possession of a dazzling quantity of lands under Umar, new challenges were confronted. Umar disliked the prospect of taking away these enormous tracts from the conquered people and giving them to the relatively few Muslim soldiers. While such an action might appear, on the surface, to follow the practice of the Prophet, it would violate the spirit of decentralization that had been its foundation. When the victorious soldiers demanded that Umar distribute the conquered lands among them, Umar met with his cabinet and devised the following solution: Noting that the previous owners of the land had paid a land-tax to their Persian overlords, he decreed the following resolution:
1) land covered by peace treaties belonged outright to the former owners, with no taxes except as specified in the treaties;
2) privately-owned land conquered by force would be turned over to the former owners with their property rights restored, provided they agreed to pay a vastly reduced (typically by two-thirds) land-tax, called kharâj, to the Muslim state;
3) unoccupied lands, wasteland, and Sasanian crown lands (as well as lands abandoned by the aristocracy) became the property of the state; part of these became the Muslim equivalent of crown lands, with sale prohibited (fay'), while another part was made available for homesteading on a usufruct basis, that is, in exchange for kharâj payment, provided the land was put to use within three years.
What are the implications of Umar's decree for Islamic economic policy? In particular, what was the purpose of the immobilization of the Sawad lands?
Some scholars (e.g., uz-Zuman 1981) seem to be under the impression that Umar denied right of sale of any lands on which kharâj was paid (which would in effect make them state property rented to the tenants), supposedly to prevent the wealthy conquerors from buying out the property rights of the native people and instituting a feudal society. This view has been refuted by those (e.g., Morony 1981, in Udovitch 1981) who have shown that such acts actually seem to have arisen in the Umayyad period. Their attribution to Umar was an invention that served to justify that dynasty's departure from the sunnah of Muhammad and Abu Bakr. In fact, the prohibition of sale of kharâj-land to Muslims only emerged after 100/718-19 (Lambton 1953, p. 53). The evident purpose "was to maintain the kharâj status of the land through the fiction of communal or state ownership. Islamic legal scholars like Mâwardî ultimately reached a position that while the property in the Sawad could not be sold, the enjoyment of such property could be sold," according to Morony (1981), who further claims Umar II's policy was a special policy not intended to be applied outside Sawad. Thus, the implication that Umar deviated from the sunnah seem unjustified, and the innovations attributed to him were probably introduced by the Umayyads.
Only through zealous protection of the property rights of the people (both their private property and the environment) can society spontaneously develop the optimal division of labor that characterizes productive economies. While earlier Islamic scholars, like Ibn Taymiyah, took the legitimacy of property for granted, Ibn Khaldun pointed out its scientific necessity for a prosperous society. He quotes from Al-Mas`udi report of Môbedhân's speech before Bahrâm: "Men persist only with the help of property. The only way to property is through cultivation [lit. `imârah]. The only way to cultivation is through justice" (Ibn Khaldun 1967, v. I, p. 64). Wehr (1976) translates `imârah as "building, edifice, structure" or "real estate, tract lot." From the context it seems we should take cultivation as development in its widest sense, not restricted to agricultural activity. This fits in with Ibn Khaldun's (1967, v. I, p. 80) assertion that four things make man unique: crafts and science; the need for "restraining influence and authority"; earning a living; and civilization. He emphasizes the need for human cooperation and social organization, for without it, "God's desire to settle the world with human beings and to leave them as His representatives on earth would not materialize" (Ibid., p. 91).
The idea that property is a consequence of development does not differ from--and anticipates--Locke's notion that use establishes the right of property. We find in Ibn Khaldun the economic concepts which appear in a rudimentary form in earlier Muslim writers have acquired a sharp definition. His analysis of the issue of the need for social cooperation stands up to Adam Smith's discussion three centuries later:
[T]he individual human being cannot by himself obtain all the necessities of life. All human beings must cooperate to that end in their civilization. But what is obtained through the cooperation of a group of human beings satisfies the need of a number many times greater (than themselves). For instance, no one by himself, can obtain the share of wheat he needs for food. But when six or ten persons, including a smith and a carpenter to make the tools, and others who are in charge of the oxen, the plowing of the soil, the harvesting of the ripe grain, and all other agricultural activities, undertake to obtain their food and work toward that purpose either separately or collectively and thus obtain through their labor a certain amount of food, (that amount) will be food for a number of people many times their own. The combined labor produces more than the needs and necessities of the workers. (Ibid., p. 272).
The function of political authority is to defend the stability of the social organization against aggression and injustice for "when civilization has thus become a fact, people need someone to exercise a restraining influence and keep then apart, for aggressiveness and injustice are in the animal nature of man" (Ibid.). It is only for this reason that someone must have authority over others, "so that no one of them will be able to attack another. This is the meaning of royal authority" (Ibid., p. 92). Ibn Khaldun ridiculed the claim of the philosophers that the ruler is necessarily one endowed by divine guidance for the exercise of the restraining influence of the religious law by noting that the majority of people have political communities without revealed guidance (Ibid., p. 93).
According to Ibn Khaldun there is only one effective method for government to increase its revenues, and that is "through the equitable treatment of people and property and regard for them" so that "they have the incentive to make their capital bear fruit and grow." His bottom line is found in the section title "Injustice brings about the ruin of civilization" (Ibn Khaldun 1967, v. II, p. 103):
It should be known that attacks on people's property remove the incentive to acquire and gain property. People then become of the opinion that the purpose and ultimate destiny of (acquiring property) is to have it taken away from them. When the incentive to acquire and obtain property is gone, people no longer make efforts to acquire any. The extent and degree to which property rights are infringed upon determines the extent and degree to which the efforts of the subjects to acquire property slacken.... Civilization and its well-being depend on productivity and people's efforts in all directions in their own interests and profit. (Ibid., p. 104)
Once a government has lost popular support, it is sustained by force.
Even though coercion makes its appearance at that time [the later years of a dynasty] and the revenues decrease, the destructive influences of this situation will become noticeable only after some time, because things in nature all have a gradual development.
In the later (years) of dynasties, famines and pestilences become numerous. As far as famines are concerned, the reason is that most people at that time refrain from cultivating the soil. For, in the later (years) of dynasties, there occur attacks on property and tax revenue and, through customs duties, on trading. (Ibid., pp. 135-136)
Ibn Khaldun leaves no room for uncertainty as to his definition of injustice:
Whoever takes someone's property, or uses him for forced labor, or presses an unjustified claim against him, or imposes upon him a duty not required by the religious law, does an injustice to that particular person. People who collect unjustified taxes commit an injustice. Those who infringe upon property rights commit an injustice.... (ibid., p. 107)
Muhammad (peace be upon him) forbade injustice because the purpose of the law is the preservation of civilization, that is, "(1) of the religion, (2) the soul (life), (3) the intellect, (4) progeny, and (5) property (Ibid., p. 107)." Decentralization of ownership of the resources down to the level of the individual, protected by a system of well-defined private property rights including the internalization of costs incurred by environmental impact must then be the first concern of any Islamic government towards the end of an economically successful society.
2. REQUIREMENT OF A HARD CURRENCY MONETARY POLICY
The oft-debated question of interest is only sub-issue of the more general matter of monetary policy. It is disturbing that modern Muslim economists have overlooked the fact that a sound money is an indispensable pre-requisite for a sound economy. Although Umar found the issue of ribâ problematical, the necessity of sound money was universally accepted not only by the Prophet and the righteous caliphs, but by every Muslim government in the early centuries of Islamic civilization. The example of the Prophet himself, who never resorted to clipping, debasing, or the issuance of unbacked paper currency, was generally followed by the Islamic society until about the year 1000. Like the Prophet, the society favored the three monetary commodities most appropriate for use as hard currency in Arabia at that time: gold, silver, and hard wheat. The righteous caliphs followed this principle without exception, and it remained the general rule until the Islamic civilization began to unravel at the turn of the millennium.
Significant departures from this principle began to appear only after the tenth century (Cahen 1981, p. 318). In 1294, the vizier of the Ilkhan Gaikhatu sought to deal with the deficit spending of his day by issuing "paper money, modeled on the Chinese paper currency. The experiment was a complete failure, as the people refused to accept the banknotes. Economic activities came to a standstill, and the Persian historian Rashid ud-din speaks even of 'the ruin of Basra' which ensued upon the emission of the new money" (Ashtor 1976, p. 257).
The door to debasement opened in the next century when the silver to gold exchange rate suffered its first serious change since the rise of Islam. In the early centuries of Islam the rate had always been around 20:1. In the thirteenth century changes in the market led scholars to speculate that the rate had changed to 10:1, but the official rate remained fixed at 20:1. "The stocks of silver in the mints decreased progressively from about 1380.... Whereas the exchange rate of the dirham had for 130 years been 1/20 dinar, that of the debased dirham was 1/25 and later 1/30 dinar" (Ashtor 1976, p. 305). The "main reason was the increased demand in Italy, where the value of silver had risen considerably at the end of the fourteenth century.... At the beginning of the fifteenth century the striking of silver dirhams was discontinued altogether" (Ibid.) Al-Mikrizi blames a high court dignitary who tried to "enrich himself by the striking of copper coins" (Ibid.). The monetary crisis was accompanied by famine and a lengthy civil war. High taxes were levied to equip the armies against repeated revolts.
Interest rates rose from 4-8% during the crusades to 18-25% in the fifteenth century (Ibid., p. 324). Although "the supply of gold from the Western Sudan was never interrupted," Sultan Barsbay in 1425 devalued the dinar "for the first time in the history of the Muslim Near East" (Ibid.). Until then the dinar had always been a gold coin of approximately 4.25 grams. With the devaluation a 3.45 gram dinar called al-Ashrafi "remained the gold coin of Egypt until the end of Mamluk rule" (Ibid.). This was the weight of the European ducat, evidence for the swing in monetary standards away from the Muslim world to the rising Christian West.
A discussion of ribâ and interest can only be meaningful within the framework of the more general issue of monetary policy (see Appendix). The main component of the nominal as opposed to real) rate of interest in modern economies is the anticipated rate of inflation and that, in economies using paper currency, this rate is dominated by government's tendency to debase the money supply. Most of the nominal interest could be eliminated by using sound currency, and a study of the legality of interest can center around any residual. Such an analysis, given in a paper before the American Muslim Social Scientists, is presented in Appendix to this paper. Its principle policy conclusion is that a prohibition on all interest may come at the expense of a decrease in the most revolutionary forms of development. This is because profit sharing cannot induce anyone to invest in an enterprise so radically innovative that only its originator can see foresee its impact and profitability. Nevertheless, most capital investment needs can be met by profit-sharing mechanisms. In any case sound monetary policy is a pre-requisite for sustainable comprehensive development. Hard money is the sunnah method for establishing sound money through the natural process of the market.
3. LIMITS ON TAXATION
Taxation is the most direct means of government intervention into the economy, and usually the first resorted to. The Qur'an names only four sources of public revenues: zakât, sadaqa, jizyah, and khums. The first is an obligation of Muslims only. It is actually a religious obligation rather than an ordinary tax. Sadaqa is purely voluntary and thus is not a tax at all in the usual sense of the term. Jizya is levied on non-Muslims only in lieu of military service and may be set by treaty. The practice of the early Muslims make it clear that it was a fee for protection of the minorities, reimbursable when the protection could not be rendered, and thus it falls in that category of taxes called user fees. Only the khums is taken purely by force, but as it is taken from the enemy in battle, it is not a tax on the citizens, but a share of the spoils of war. In the Prophet's time the khums was given to the Prophet for use at his discretion both for his personal and family needs as well as for disbursements to the poor and needy and public works. One can interpret this as state property out of which the ruler may take a share or as private property of the commander-in-chief out of which he is expected to give sadaqa. In the former case it is a tax on booty rather than on persons. In the latter case, the required public expenditures constitute a tax on the commander-in-chief and not on the general public.
On this account, it appears that taxation authorized by the Qur'an is strictly limited. This is as we should expect, based on the Prophet's hadith that one should not take the property of another Muslim without his consent. The sunnah supports this view. In the time of Muhammad and Abu Bakr, there was no other source of public revenue beyond those authorized by the Qur'an. An alleged exception is found in the claim that the Prophet collected kharâj from the Jews of Khaybar. Siddiqi (1970, p. 17) writes:
When Khaybar was conquered by the Prophet, ... the Jews recognizing the conquerors as the owners of the entire conquered land (after the custom of the day), offered to cultivate the lands as the tenants of the State and paid a part of the produce. The Prophet granted them their request and fixed the Kharaj at half of the produce.
There are two ways to interpret this. Taken at face value the Jews were recognizing the lands as state lands (fay'). In this case the payments constituted rent and not a tax. If, however, the payments were a land-tax, then the rate having been set by treaty constitutes a negotiated jizyah and is still not outside the authorization of the Qur'an.
Thus it is clear that the Prophet never assessed any taxes beyond those specified in the Qur'an except as a user fee. The same is true of Abu Bakr. The general practice of the righteous caliphs supports this analysis. Thus Abû `Abdullâh Mu`âwiya ibn `Ubayd Allâh wrote in a treatise on taxation for the caliph al-Mahdî (Lapidus, 1981):
"all the expenses of digging, including supporting poles, the construction of vaulted passages and bridges, the cleaning up of rivers and the maintenance of post-stations and dams on the great rivers are to be borne by the treasury." Otherwise, however, irrigation canals are evidently considered part of the private domain, and lawyers discuss the questions of water rights and the distribution of irrigation expenses among private persons. They leave the impression that the responsibility of the state was rather limited.
Umar, however, did introduce two new taxes: he imposed tariffs and he expanded the kharâj to cases other than a modified jizyah. Tariffs had been unknown in Arabia. We can imagine Umar's distaste at finding the nations of the world engaged in this form of highway robbery against the merchant who crossed their borders. As the Qur'an authorizes like-kind retaliation against aggression (2:194), he imposed a policy of reciprocity. In an economically savvy effort to minimize the burden of the retaliatory tariffs on Muslims and the dhimmis under their protection, however, he gave a 50% discount to dhimmis and a 75% discount to Muslims.. Further, he counted as a dhimmi for this purpose any non-Muslim whose stay in Muslim lands exceeded one year. It is ironic that Umar's strategic actions to fight against tariffs have been misinterpreted by some modern Muslim economists as an indication that Umar believed that the state can impose any kind of taxes it wants. It has also been disastrous for the freedom and prosperity of the Muslim ummah.
We have already discussed Umar's use of kharâj in the section on the land issue. We may presume that he saw a similarity between the Persian land tax and the usufruct form of jizyah which the Prophet accepted in the case of the Jews. Since the tax that he levied was so much lower than that assessed by the Persians, we may also presume that both he and his new subjects looked upon the terms as agreeable ones, comparable to terms fixed by treaty. Unfortunately, the kharâj here resembles the Persian land tax (which was called kharâg and from which the term kharâj may stem) more than jizyah precisely because it is not fixed by treaty, but may be altered by the state at its discretion. Umar was concerned about this and is reported to have repeatedly warned his governors not to set the rates oppressively high. He interrogated the assessors of Sawâd: "Perhaps you assessed the land at a rate which it cannot stand," and they replied, "No, on the contrary, we have assessed it at a rate which it can stand, although if we had assessed a higher rate the land could still stand it" (Ra`ana 1977, p. 93).
When the Umayyads took power the governors repeatedly raised the kharâj until revenues plummeted under the Hajjaj--legendary for his oppressive tax policies. Subsequently the pious Umar II attempted a return to Umar I's tax policies. "The spirit of economic laws is justice (`adl) and generosity (ihsâ)," he declared (uz-Zaman 1981, p. 75). Revenues rebounded. Unfortunately, his successors strayed from his policies. As the Umayyad dynasty came to a close its ruler confessed: "We committed injustice to our subjects and they became disappointed with our justice. They wished to get rid of us. Our tax-payers were overburdened so they deserted us, destroyed our estates, and emptied our treasuries" (Ibid., pp. 75-76). Yazîd III responded to the outcry against public spending by pledging spending and taxing limitations, but it was too late (Ibid., p. 101).
Throughout Islamic history tax policies seesawed as dynasties rose and fell. Studying them, Ibn Khaldun came to his famous conclusion (recently reincarnated as the "Laffer curve") that dynasties obtain large revenues from low tax rates at their beginnings and small revenues from high tax rates at their ends (Ibn Khaldun 1967, v. II, p. 89).
In the twelfth century, the Seldjukids sought to compensate for the loss of revenue from the land-tax by increasing other taxes or imposing new ones. There were a long series of farcical repeals and reimpositions of taxes (uz-Zaman 1981, p. 217). In at least one cases the demand for repeal came from the minbar. As Iraq became increasingly burdened by the taxes--and by government attempts to monopolize important industries, like silk (Ashtor 1976, p. 214)--Iraq lost its capacity for technological innovation. Thus, the chronicles of Ibn al-Djauzi speak "of mills which were turning and grinding grain on the earth without anyone knowing how they were operated," Ibid., p. 219). The infrastructure crumbled throughout the twelfth century and engineers failed in massive projects. A "contemporary Arab chronicler says explicitly that the government services were incapable of repairing the breaches" in dams in Iraq (Ibid., p. 245).
This stagnation took place as European technology was beginning to blossom. "The great industrial enterprises" could no longer "afford experiments which resulted in technological innovations" once the Seldjukids and Ayyubid "princes curtailed freedom of enterprise, established monopolies and imposed heavy taxes on the workshops. This brought about a slow decline of private industry" (Ibid., p. 247).
The Mongols (Ilkhanids) imposed numerous and arbitrary taxes. Ghazan (1295-1304) attempted some reforms like a fixed tax on land, the abolition of "the quartering of soldiers and officials in private houses and he forbade the use of violence in the collection of taxes" (Ibid., p. 250) and also made feudal fiefs hereditary. Any positive effect of these reforms was washed out by the expansion of the feudal system in other respects. Not only prisoners of war, but even clients and retainers were treated as slaves. "According to the law of Ghazan a peasant who had run away from a feudal estate even thirty years earlier was caught and sent back" (Ibid., p. 258). Under these circumstances, Ghazan's policy of offering state lands to those who would cultivate them with grants of tax reductions as incentives, a policy followed by his successors, met with "only partial success" (Ibid.) and after Ghazan a "new downward trend in agricultural production began" (Ibid.).
Mongols increased state lands including confiscation of waqf property. But later, as early as the 1280s, the government initiated land sales. The increasing private estates "took the lead in Irak's agriculture, as to both output and means of cultivation" (Ibid., p. 261). They responded to the drop in grain demand due to depopulation by switching to other crops, notably cotton and fruit trees. After the death of Abu Said (1316-35) civil war ensued. In subsequent dynasties the merciless misgovernment continued.
The Djalairid dynasty was overthrown in 1410 by Kara Yusuf, chieftain of a federation of Turcomen tribes called the Kara Koyunlu. Their dynasty, by contemporary accounts, brought about the most wretched conditions in the history of Iraq (Ibid., p. 268). Uzun Hasan, prince of the Ak Koyunlu conquered Baghdad in 1469, and then most of Persia. Uzun Hasan codified tax practices with the aim of removing their arbitrary nature and also reduced the land tax (Ibid., p. 272). Taxation was still oppressive however. While peasants of Diyar Bakr province were subject to a 20% tax on crops, they were also subject to forced labor and "many other taxes" besides (Ibid., p. 273).
The Turcomans perfected the feudal land system in Iraq. Fiefholders received a perpetual hereditary grant and "administrative and judicial immunity" (Ibid.). Uzun and his successors granted fiefs to the clergy to win their support. When the Ak Koyunlu realized that they were headed down the road of disintegration they tried to take back many of the fiefs and waqf land but were opposed by both the lords and the theologians.
The domestic and foreign trade of Iraq was seriously set back under the Djalairids and the Turcomans and the economy sank into barter (Ibid., p. 274) . Rather than undo the measures driving down so many areas of domestic and foreign trade, the Turcomens increased taxes on trade. The tamgha, for example, which the scholar Nasir ad-Din Tusi advised should be set at 1/240, was levied in Tabriz at 5% in the early 14th century. Uzun Hasan's advisors dissuaded him from abolishing it. Of course, governors and feudal lords were exempt from the taxes (Ibid., p. 275).
Unsurprisingly, the trade route shifted from the Persian Gulf to the Mediterranean (Ibid., p. 277). In addition to the factors discussed above, changing political conditions at the end of the 15th century (deteriorating conditions in Persia, Genoese victories adversely affecting the Venetians, and Mamluk and Mongol conquests all favoring a resurgence of Red Sea trade) forced Venetians to return to trade through Alexandria and Beirut (Ibid., p. 326).
The history of Muslim tax policies demonstrates the validity of Ibn Khaldun's thesis on the rise and fall of dynasties. At the beginning of their power new dynasties are led by men of bedouin inclinations with no taste for luxury. Their spartan existence makes small demands on the body politic and they devote themselves to the proper purpose of government. The success of their rule leads to a thriving urban civilization. The high prosperity for a while permits government diversion of profits into luxuries. By the time the adverse effects (due to hidden costs) of the expansion of government activity into luxury areas is noticeable, it is too late to change for the generation raised in luxury have lost the meritorious attitudes of their ancestors that made effective minimalist government possible. As the dynasty grows old, the beneficiaries of urban civilization and of government largess
have become used to laziness and ease. They are sunk in well-being and luxury. They have entrusted defense of their property and their lives to the governor and ruler who rules them, and to the militia which has the task of guarding them. They find full assurance of safety in the walls that surround them, and the fortifications that protect them. Thy are carefree and trusting, and have ceased to carry weapons. Successive generations have grown up in this way of life. They have become like women and children, who depend upon the master of the house. (Ibid., p. 257)
The dynasty expands its authorities in various ways to try to maintain its luxuriant expenditure policies. In addition to tampering with the currency, there is, of course, taxation. Initially increasing tax rates serves the purpose, but eventually high tax rates have a deleterious effect on productivity. "It should be known that at the beginning of the dynasty, taxation yields a large revenue from small assessments. At the end of a dynasty, taxation yields a small revenue from large assessments" (Ibid., p. 89).
Among the reasons that no capitalist will be able to accumulate limitless wealth is the envy of the government (Ibid.):
... a sedentary person who has a great deal of capital and has acquired a great number of estates and farms and become one of the wealthiest inhabitants of a particular city, who is looked upon as such and lives in great luxury ... competes in this respect with amirs and rulers. The latter become jealous of him. The aggressiveness that is natural to human beings makes them cast their eyes on his possessions. They envy him and try every possible trick to catch him in the net of a government decision to confiscate his property. Government decisions are as a rule unjust, because pure justice is found only in the legal caliphate that lasted only a short while. Muhammad said: "The caliphate after me will last thirty years; then, it will revert to being tyrannic royal authority."
If Muslim states wish to see prospering economies they should reduce the variety and size of taxes. Ideally they should impose only those taxes authorized by the Qur'an and at those rates practiced by the righteous caliphs: zakât on Muslims), jizyah from non-Muslims which may include kharâj. In addition voluntary sadaqah may be accepted for worthwhile purposes and user fees (including kharâj and ushr) assessed for payment for services desired by the public and provided by the state for reasons of expedience. This interpretation of kharâj is supported by the use of the term in the Qur'an (23:72, for example). Also the state would remain entitled to the khums from the spoils of war. All protective tariffs should be dropped except for reciprocal tariffs, and even they should be subject to discounts of 75% for Muslims and 50% for dhimmis. The degree to which states exceed these taxes is at once the degree to which they transgress beyond the sharî`ah and the measure by which they detract from the welfare of the society as a whole by diverting wealth needed for investment into less productive, or destructive pursuits.
4. LIMITS ON THE DOMAIN OF THE PUBLIC SECTOR
The Islamic societies' experiments with government involvement in economic activity track with its gradual downfall. In the time of Umar the state contented itself with matters of defense, the judicial system, weights and measures, and such major public works as irrigation canals which were paid for by the kharâj and `ushr user fees. None of the righteous caliphs sought to engage the state in competition with the private sector, let alone to monopolize any part of it. Umar's involvement in land distribution was aimed at decentralization and the prevention of the rise of a feudalistic system. Even charges that Uthman's administration favored certain groups and individuals comes under the category of corruption rather than monopoly. State intervention in the economy became an increasing problem as the centuries rolled on, however.
In the Umayyad dynasty, Umar II felt that state participation in commerce is a form of unintended abuse of trust: "I am of the view that the ruler should not trade. It is (also) not lawful for the officer to trade in the area of his office (fî sultanihî...), because when he involves himself in trade he inadvertently misuses his office in his interest and to the detriment of others, even if he does not like to do so" (Uz-Zaman 1981, p. 94). He did, however, intervene in cases where the costs of risks were falling to the state: "As I considered over it I found that gain in mining was but particular (khâs) but its harm was general (`âm) so stop people from working in mines" (Ibid.)
After the fall of the Abbasids, the government was not so scrupulous. The devastating effects of the government's intervention into the Egyptian sugar industry has been well-documented by Ashtor (1976, 1981). The rise of the hitherto unknown sugar industry in the Middle East is a testimony to the economic dynamism of Islam and its openness to technical innovation both from the scientific and economic side. The Egyptian sugar industry began its boom in the 11th century:
The sugar industry in Egypt and Syria under the Fatimids had a capitalistic character. The complicated methods of refining the juice of the sugar cane could only be employed in big factories. ... Rich and enterprising industrialists had to make costly efforts to improve methods, the expected profits being the stimulus. Sugar production also enjoyed freedom of enterprise. The attempt to monopolize it made by the odd and whimsical al-Hakim was not repeated" (Ashtor 1976, pp. 199-200).
In the second half of the thirteenth century the number of Egyptian sugar factories boomed as the Mamluk amirs, lured by the demonstrated high profitability, broke with earlier Muslim law and practice to compete against the private entrepreneurs (Ashtor 1981, p. 99ff). In our summary of Ashtor's analysis (Ahmad 1993 a,b) we have shown in sufficient detail how such expansion of the public sector into the sugar industry led to its downfall, to be replaced by Western producers.
The declining economies caused declining demand. The shift in sources of sugar for Italy can be seen in the tariff records. Early fifteenth century Venetian documents show a shift in the point of origin of molasses for Italy from Egypt to Palermo (Ibid., p. 113). Although the relative abundance of water power for mills in Europe played a factor, the role of government is more significant:
The system of government as it had been developed in the Middle East created conditions that were unfavorable to technological innovations. The feudal lords did not retain their fiefs in perpetuity; since changes were frequently made, they had little interest in building new factories. The musâdara system was a sword of Damocles poised over the heads of all the rich or near rich. The mukûs, commercial taxes, were another check to technological development.... Technological progress also depended, to a certain degree, on the structure of industry. Owing to the large share of government in the sugar industry, there was a lack of competition, a tendency towards corruption in the monopolized industries, and a lack of incentive for innovations. (Ibid., p. 119)
Ashtor implicates demographic trends in the downfall of the Egyptian sugar industry (Ibid., p. 120), but governmental policies also affect demographic trends. The increasingly feudalistic land tenure structures had an adverse affect on population patterns. Nizam al-Mulk, in the Book of Politics states that "the peasants, having been impoverished by heavy taxation and extortion, are ruined and dispersed." (See Ashtor 1976).
At the beginning of the fifteenth century most of the monopolized industries (sugar, soap, paper, silk and other fabrics, glass) collapsed. "[A]l-Makrizi writes that after 1404 people were compelled to dress themselves in the woolen stuffs imported by European merchants" (Ibid., p. 307). The role of government factories in the technological decline of Near Eastern industry is unmistakable. With cheaper sources for raw materials (in part produced on the royal estates), the "sultans and amirs used their power to curtail the activities of their competitors by taxation or by the establishment of monopolies. ... The royal factories themselves were ruined by corrupt managers whose maladministration induced the sultans in the course of time to abolish the tiraz system altogether. Industrial production sank to the level of small workshops which could not afford long and costly experiments" (Ibid., p. 308-309).
According to Ibn Khaldun, shipbuilding skills had declined to the point that "in case of need the governments must have recourse to foreign help" (Ibid.). As Muslim skills in, for example, silver inlay vanished, Venetians picked it up from Syrian Jews.
The decline of wheat was a landmark. It had been the staple, but with the arrival of the last decade of the fifteenth century, millet and dhura bread were being consumed in Cairo and barley in Damascus--even by the governor and the princes (Ibid.). With the breakdown and flight to the cities there came thousands of unemployed paupers, victimized by diseases--chronic and epidemic. Desperate, they provided a recruitment pool for warring factions and rebels. "The lowest stratum of this class were the so-called harafish, beggars who were to be found near the mosques and elsewhere and who were allied to certain groups of dervishes" (Ibid., p. 320). Skilled workers were in better shape only because there was such a shortage of them. The petty bourgeois, however, "were impoverished by the fiscal policy of the Mamluk government" (Ibid.).
In addition to the burdens of trade taxes there were numerous other extortions. We have already mentioned the tarh, which compelled merchants to buy overpriced products from their government competitors. Such measures were periodically abolished and then resurrected. Muslim jurisprudence did not allow for price-fixing outside times of emergency, but the Mamluks fixed prices when it suited their interests (Ibid.).
At the same time land-tenure changes gave rise to a feudalist system placing the bourgeois in an inferior position. The legal scholars were also made subservienbt to the state through government appointments to judgeships or teaching positions at schools endowed by the Mamluks, inducing collaboration (Ibid., p. 284). Using a practice resurrected in current-day Egypt, the government avoided responding to the theologians' protests against the governmental extortions, by instead wooing them by such measures as "promulgating decrees against the Christians and Jews" (Ibid., p. 285) Thus an intellectual aristocracy of judges and professors appointed by the government arose. The disfavored classes engaged in mob riots, but no organized revolutionary movement. "[A]ll classes of society were imbued with a spirit of rigid orthodoxy which made a social revolution allied to sectarian tendencies unthinkable" (Ibid., p. 322). Yet, the co-option of the religious scholars pre-empted any jihâd against the oppressive regime.
Despite the consequent favorable balance of payments due to the change of trade routes discussed in the preceding section, and continuing supply of Sudanese gold, "the economy of the Mamluk kingdom crumbled in the second half of the fifteenth century" (Ibid,, p.327). "The flourishing economy of the Near East had been ruined by the rapacious military, and its great civilizing achievements had been destroyed through inability to adopt new methods of production and new ways of life" (Ibid,, p. 331). The economic breakdown led to the political and military collapse. Reasons for breakdown: decay of Egyptian industry; extravagant luxury of the ruling class; hoarding of money (a consequence of musâdara?); and military spending. At the same time Portuguese were expanding and in the second half of the 15th c. Their seizure of "great quantities of Sudanese gold" was felt in Cairo (Ibid., p. 329-330).
Ibn Khaldun analyzed and denounced government competition with the private sector as a means of revenue enhancement. He titles a section of the Muqaddimah "Commercial activity on the part of the ruler is harmful to his subjects and to the tax revenue" (Ibid., p. 93). He elaborates that the ruler has an unfair advantages in (1) using state wealth in competition with private resources; (2) having taxing authority; (3) having ability to force purchases at above market prices; (4) intimidating competition and suppliers to force selling below market (Ibid., p. 94). The consequent "financial difficulties and loss of profit ... takes away all incentive to effort, thus ruining the fiscal (structure)" (Ibid., p. 95). With the merchants and farmers driven out of business, tax revenues dry up and the government has undermined its best source of revenue.
Furthermore, (the trading of the ruler) may cause the destruction of civilization and, through [it] the destruction of the dynasty. When the subjects can no longer make their capital larger through agriculture and commerce, it will decrease and disappear as a result of expenditures. This will ruin their situation. This should be understood. (Ibid., p. 95)
Muslim states which wish to see an industrial revolution should pursue a policy that permits the private sector to engage in any and all halâl pursuits. The primary role the Muslim state is the establishment of justice. Arbitration is better suited to this goal that regulation and licensing. While there are some infrastructure tasks that can be expeditiously handled by the state without jeopardizing or contradicting its primary task, they are few in number and increasing them constitutes a slippery slope to economic failure.
5. CONCLUSIONS
Those who, of their own free will and without any compulsion act according to the Book (Qu'rân) and the News (Hadîth) wear the turban of freedom (Khwaja-i-Jahan Mahmud Gawan quoted by Sherwani 1959).
We conclude by showing the implications for comprehensive development of Muslim countries in the modern era. A proper mindset for understanding what economic policy can and cannot do is aided by always remembering that bay`ah is a contract between the rulers and the people. Ibn Khaldun (Ibid., p. 429) notes that the scholar "Mâlik pronounced the legal decision that a declaration obtained by compulsion was invalid..." for which he was persecuted. We can sense his distaste when he notes that in his own day the shaking the leader's hand had been replaced by "greeting kings by kissing the earth (in front of them), or their hand, their foot, or the lower hem of their garment" (Ibid.).
The list of the proper functions of government is a short one: (Ibid., v. II, p. 3):
1) "defend and protect the community from its enemies."
2) "enforce restraining laws among the people, in order to prevent mutual hostility and attacks upon property. This includes improving the safety of the roads."
3) "cause the people to act in their own best interests, and ... supervise such general matters involving their livelihood and mutual dealings as foodstuffs and weights and measures, in order to prevent cheating."
4) oversee the mint to prevent fraud in currency.
5) Exercise political leadership.
Items 2-5 are distinctly economic in purpose. It is interesting that item 4 permits private minting which was in fact the early Muslim practice. Ibn Khaldun comments (Ibid., p. 55): "The government paid no attention to the matter. As a result, the frauds practiced with dinars and dirhams eventually became very serious" in the year 74 A. H. or 75 A. H. Thus in 76 (695-696 C. E.) Abd-al-Malik standardized the dirham with the emblem "God is one, God is the samad."
F. A. Hayek (1967) attributed to David Hume the "invention" that in its positive aims government was entitled to "no power of coercion and was subject to the same general and inflexible rules which aim at an overall order by creating its negative conditions: peace, liberty, and justice." Centuries before Hume was born, however, the applicability of sharî`ah to government was a seminal concept in Islam. The claim that Islamic society was governed more by situation ethics (see, e.g., Talbi 1981) than by the Qur'an and sunnah contains some truth, but is misleading. Muslim society strayed away from these principles gradually. Initially by constraints on land distribution and expansion of taxation, later in government interference in the economy, and finally in the loss of respect for private property and individual liberty. But until the thirteenth century, Muslim scholars, largely independent of the government, continued to develop a fiqh grounded in the Qur'an and sunnah as they understood it (Ahmad 1993a, 1994). It was only with the closing of the door to ijtihâd that actual practice substituted for the standards of the divine law. Islamic society paid the price for it.
Muslim scholars who interpret early Muslim practice as a precedent for whatever intervention in which a modern state wishes to engage do so only by ignoring the clear text of the Qur'an and dropping the context of the Prophet's advisory in the farewell pilgrimage. The best hope for an Islamic renaissance is to return to the fundamentals of Islam, i.e., the Qur'an and the principles exemplified by the practice of the Prophet. They do the ummah a disservice. Muslim nations eager for economic development should neither imitate the majoritarian policies of developed countries entering into the declining phases of their economic success nor should they retain authoritarian policies which account for their current stagnation. Rather, they should emulate the policies which permitted industrial development to occur in the first place. And what nascent society would be better to emulate than the Islamic society at the outset of its golden era? The implications for economic policy are clear:
1) Define and defend the property rights of the people, which should be as expansive as possible;
2) Issue a currency fully backed by hard monetary commodities;
3) Restrict public revenues to sources authorized by the sharî'ah and practiced by the khalifah rashidûn (zakât, jizyah, sadaqa, khums, and justifiable user fees including kharâj and `ushr) and limit them to the lawful limits;
4) End all government interference with economy apart from the prohibition of the initiation of coercion, fraud or other harâm activities.
The implicit limitations on the size and scope of government (as well as its decentralization) can also be a mechanism for the elimination of corruption which is another major problem for economic growth.
APPENDIX:
RIBA AND INTEREST: DEFINITIONS AND IMPLICATIONS
(delivered at 22nd Conference of American Muslim Social Scientists
Oct. 15-17, 1993 in Herndon, VA)
[ABSTRACT: The overwhelming majority of scholars have historically held that all interest falls under the rubric of ribâ, banned by the Qur'an. We argue that neither ribâ nor interest have been well defined in the Islamic literature. If we define ribâ as it is used in the Qur'an and sunnah and define pure interest as the term is used by Böhm-Bawerk, we discover that the terms are not synonymous. We demonstrate that some of the criteria traditionally used to identify ribâ, such as time-element, contradict the sunnah. We conclude that ribâ includes all forms of overcharging, including overcharging on interest (usury). We show that some practices held as harâm by the traditionalists are in fact mandatory in order to avoid ribâ. On the other hand the now common practice of issuing unbacked paper currency, scrupulously avoided by Muslims in the first 400 years of the Hijrah era, constitutes a form of ribâ which puts economies at great risk.]
Most of the scholars who have investigated the issue of ribâ have simply assumed that ribâ and interest are synonymous, and then pointed to the unambiguous denunciation of ribâ in the Qur'an to justify their opposition to all forms of interest. This is a very poor methodology. It trivializes an issue so complex that Umar listed as one of the three matters on which he wished the Prophet (peace upon him) had provided more guidance. My approach shall be to take for granted the prohibition of ribâ as being glaringly evident from the Qur'anic texts (3:130;2:275-279) and seek to establish what the word means. We shall then compare this concept against the concepts of interest, usury, and overcharging, and argue that the latter two are, depending on the context, better translations of the term ribâ than interest.
Semantically ribâ means an excess or an addition. The context of the discussion of ribâ in the Qur'an makes four things (besides its prohibition) abundantly clear: (1) that it involves amounts which are in some sense large; (2) that its distinction from legitimate trade is so obvious that only a madman could confuse the two; (3) that it may be contrasted to charity; (4) that it is unjust. It is critical to notice that the principle exposition on the subject of ribâ occurs in the middle of a passage on charity (in Surat-al-baqara):
(267) O ye who believe! Give of the good things which ye have (honourably) earned, and of the fruits of the earth which We have produced for you, and do not even aim at getting anything which is bad, in order that out of it ye may give away something, when ye yourselves would not receive it except with closed eyes. And know that God is free of all wants, and worthy of all praise.
(268) The Evil One threatens you with poverty and bids you to conduct unseemly. God promiseth you His forgiveness and bounties. And God careth for all and He knoweth all things.
(269) He granteth wisdom to whom He pleaseth; and he to whom wisdom is granted receiveth Indeed a benefit overflowing; but none will grasp the Message but men of understanding.
(270) And whatever ye spend in charity or devotion, be sure God knows it all. But the wrong-doers have no helpers.
(271) If ye disclose (acts of) charity, even so it is well, but if ye conceal them, and make them reach those (really) in need, that is best for you: It will remove from you some of your (stains of) evil. And God Is well acquainted with what ye do.
(272) It is not required of thee (O Apostle), to set them on the right path, but God sets on the right path whom He pleaseth. Whatever of good ye give benefits your own souls, and ye shall only do so seeking the "face" of God. Whatever good ye give, shall be rendered back to you, and ye shall not be dealt with unjustly.
(273) (Charity is) for those in need, who, in God's cause are restricted (from travel), and cannot move about in the land, seeking (for trade or work): the ignorant man thinks, because of their modesty, that they are free from want. Thou shalt know them by their (unfailing) mark: they beg not importunately from all and sundry. and whatever of good ye give, be assured God knoweth it well.
(274) Those who (in charity) spend of their goods by night and by day, in secret and in public, have their reward with their lord: on them shall be no fear, nor shall they grieve.
(275) Those who devour usury will not stand except as stands one whom the Evil One by his touch hath driven to madness. That is because they say: "trade is like usury," but God hath permitted trade and forbidden usury. Those who after receiving direction from their lord, desist, shall be pardoned for the past; their case is for God (to judge); but those who repeat (the offence) are companions of the fire: they will abide therein (for ever).
(276) God will deprive usury of all blessing, but will give increase for deeds of charity: for he loveth not creatures ungrateful and wicked.
(277) Those who believe, and do deeds of righteousness, and establish regular prayers and regular charity, will have their reward with their lord: on them shall be no fear, nor shall they grieve.
(278) O ye who believe! Fear God, and give up what remains of your demand for usury, if ye are indeed believers.
(279) If ye do it not, take notice of war from God and his apostle: but if ye turn back, ye shall have your capital sums: deal not unjustly, and ye shall not be dealt with unjustly.
(280) If the debtor is in a difficulty, grant him time till it is easy for him to repay. But if ye remit it by way of charity, that is best for you if ye only knew. Interest is a predetermined fixed rate of return. Usury means an excessive interest. Overcharging means an excessive price of any sort.
In the Prophet's day few loans were for the purpose of raising venture capital. The usual purpose of a loan was to allow persons in deep financial need to make it to next week. Due to the state of extreme need of such borrowers, the rate of interest on these loans tended to be exorbitant ("doubled and multiplied," 3:130), resulting in additional debt to the borrower as the interest charges made him worse off. The context of the quotes above, immediately followed by a fiery denunciation of ribâ and an entreatment to charity makes this circumstance clear (2:275-281). It is thus unsurprising that the early Islamic scholars perceived all commercial interest as usury.
At root of the attacks on interest is the assumption that by one standard or another it is unearned. There is certainly a distinction between the function of the entrepreneur and of the capitalist. The entrepreneur makes decisions, studies markets, takes risks in that his profit is not predetermined, etc. The capitalist does nothing. He is the owner of the money which the entrepreneur uses. (Note that the entrepreneur may also be a capitalist to the degree that he uses his own money, and the capitalist is an entrepreneur to the degree that he makes investment decisions and assumes risks). It is not risk that makes up "pure" interest, for to the extent that risk is involved that may also be considered entrepreneurial profit. The "capitalist" is then actually an "investor" who is then part entrepreneur and part capitalist. But the risk in a long term government bond does not explain the 6% interest rates current as this paper is being written.
Böhm-Bawerk (1959) has shown that the market rate of interest is not an addition to (or excess over) capital value. This is due to the fact that the source of value is the subjective desire of the participants in the market, and it is a fact that, subjectively, people tend to prefer access to their money now rather than in the future. The key here is access to money. It is true that there are numerous circumstances under which I would want to store my money for future use: a child's education, retirement, a nest egg against emergencies, etc. But even in these cases, I would prefer to have the right to get my principle on demand in case I change my mind. Thus there is a difference between demand deposits and time deposits. In the former case I have given up nothing, and it will indeed be an excess (ribâ) to collect interest. In the latter case, the present value of money inaccessible until a set future time is less than the present value of the same money with no such constraint. This time-preference means that a person considering a time-deposit is being offered a diminution of the subjective value of capital unless a compensatory interest is also offered. Those for whom the market rate of interest exceeds this value difference would be making a profit, but those for whom it is less will be taking a loss. Forcing someone to accept less than the market rate would thus constitute a diminution of the capital sum, a violation of the Qur'anic explication of the terms of the Qur'anic prohibition of ribâ: "but if ye turn back [i.e., abandon ribâ] ye shall have your capital sums; deal not unjustly and ye shall not be dealt with unjustly" (2:279). Thus we see the reason that discounts for cash and surcharges for credit, agreed to between vendor and buyer, have always been permitted by Islamic law.
How does interest on a loan issued by a third party differ from the discount for cash or surcharge for credit? From an economic point of view it does not, except that it adds greater flexibility to the market. Consider the case in which a buyer is willing to pay $2100 next year for a used car but the seller wants $2000 right now. A deal is impossible. But if a third party agrees to lend $2000 to the buyer in exchange for $2100 a year from now, the buyer is happy, the seller is happy, and the lender is happy. Prohibiting such a transaction serves no purpose. Islamic scholars who maintain that all interest is usurious are in the position of claiming that although it would be permissible for the buyer to pay $2000 now, or for the seller to accept $2100 next year, it prohibited for the lender to make both of these possible at the same time.
Abu-Saud (1986) agrees that such a transaction is not harâm, but distinguishes between it and loans for more general purposes. In the example I have cited the loan is for a specific purchase, with the lender as a clear substitute for the buyer in a clearly halâl transaction. Abu-Saud does not believe that the analogy can be further extended to what he calls "charitable debt." Should we consider all "clear cash loans" to be examples of charitable debt? Following the overwhelming majority of scholars, Abu-Saud (1986) argues:
The prohibition of paying an extra amount to the lender of cash is originally based on the fact that money is a "quasi commodity" and has no intrinsic utility, though it serves the purpose of obtaining the utilities of other commodities and goods. Unless its holder uses it, i.e. spends it, it would not give him any economic satisfaction. Thus, Islamicly speaking, if there is a surplus of money in the hands of its owner, it would not, and indeed should not, earn any yield as long as does not exert any effort or undertake any risk. The Islamic principle we should always remember is there is no reward without work and no work without reward.
This argument is erroneous, however, on a number of grounds. In the first place, money commodities like gold do have an "intrinsic" value (one should say use value). Natural monetary commodities, unlike paper currency, evolve a monetary value after being prized initially for their utility. The fact that their monetary utility comes to outweigh their other uses (say in industry or as ornamentation) does not change this fact. Indeed their monetary use only adds to their value. Further, the argument suggests a reliance on the theory of labor value that dominated the thinking of Adam Smith, David Ricardo, and Karl Marx, but which has been demonstrated to be false. Value is not determined by labor, but is subjective. The subjective nature of value leads to numerous consequences in economics, such as marginal utility and time preference. Following the discussion above, it is time preference that brings about a positive rate of interest. Thus the payment of interest is a means of compensating the lender for agreeing to defer payback, which constitutes a loss of value to the lender whom the Qur'an has guaranteed shall suffer no such loss.
The traditional Muslim position has been defended against this type of criticism on the grounds that it is merely the institution of interest that is opposed and not the de facto interest involved in all time-dependent transactions. Given the fungibility of money it seems that a prohibition on the institution of interest is easily circumvented, and there are numerous examples of such circumvention in Islamic history. I propose that there is one very important case where a prohibition on interest is difficult to circumvent, and I suggest that this may be the explanation for the peculiar fact that Islamic world in the classical era never achieved an industrial revolution.
In most cases any proposed fixed interest transaction can be converted into an equivalent (for purposes of marketability) profit-sharing transaction. This is the theory behind the so-called "Islamic banking." There are a few exceptions. Treasury bills, which pay an interest that is not derived from business profits, are a problem, but that problem is gotten around in an Islamic economy by avoiding deficit spending. A more serious problem is reflected in the fact that extremely high risk investments are difficult to finance in the absence of fixed interest. This has been demonstrated by Abdul Aziz (1993) in the case of Islamic economies, but the general principle is obvious in the following hypothetical case. Consider an entrepreneur with an idea so revolutionary that he cannot persuade anyone of its profitability. His offers to various capitalists to permit them a share in profits that they are certain shall be non-existent is fruitless. No profit/loss sharing ratio can be advantageous enough to entice them. Even if he offers them 100% of the profits and none of the losses, they would decline because they would not sacrifice the opportunity costs for what they perceive to be non-existent chance of profit. This would explain why it was the West and not the Muslim world that produced commercial products like electricity and the automobile which were considered laughable ideas by all but the visionaries who brought them to the market.
Let us now return to the definitions of the terms of interest. Most authorities claim that ribâ involves a fixed non zero rate of return for one commodity against a like commodity over time. An examination of the hadith which Abu-Saud (1986) deemed authentic on this subject demonstrates that this interpretation is incorrect on the following grounds. The Prophet (peace be upon him) included in this prohibition certain spot transactions such as the exchange of dates of differing quality unless the exchange was mediated by a market price evaluation of the commodities being exchange. This is traditionally known as ribâ al-Fadhl. Thus we have a kind of ribâ in which no time element exists. Conversely, one can have transactions in which deferred payment with a surcharge for credit is permitted, as we have seen above. Then time element is clearly not the defining element of ribâ.
Then what is the defining element of ribâ? I propose that it is overcharging. This is the element in common in every example given in Qur'an and hadith. The insistence on a market evaluation of the dates in the barter exchange of unlike materials is clearly representative of a concern over overcharging. The same applies to the Prophet's prohibition of brokers' taking unfair advantage of caravans unaware of changes in market prices. A fraudulent misrepresentation of the market price constitutes ribâ:
A man displayed some goods in the market and took a false oath that he had been offered so much for them, though he was not offered that amount. Then the following Divine Verse was revealed: "Verily those who purchase a little gain at the cost of Allah's covenant and their oaths ... will get a painful punishment." (3:77) Ibn Abâ Aufâ added, "Such a person as described above is a treacherous Ribâ-eater (i.e. eater of usury).
When overcharging is applied to fixed rates of interest, it is called usury.
It follows that interest may or may not be usurious, depending upon whether or not the rate charged exceeds the market clearing rate of interest. But when would an agreed-to interest rate exceed the market rate? The answer is clear when we return to the context in which the Qur'an denounces ribâ: namely, when a charitable loan is at issue. It is only the poor and needy, etc. who agree to pay usurious interest rates because of their disadvantaged position in the market place. The Muslim is prohibited not only from charging such rates but from paying them. That is, because such a rates is illegal, lenders who would charge higher rates than they themselves are willing to accept are forced to take market rates. But the context makes clear that in these cases we should give charity instead. This may be in the form of an interest-free loan, or outright sadaqa.
To understand this consider the following case of overcharging to which the principle enunciated in the Qur'anic passages would clearly apply even though there is no time element:
A boatman takes people across the river for one dinar. One day, as he is crossing the river he sees a drowning man calling for help. He tells the drowning man, I will give you a ride, but you must pay me. The drowning man, of course, agrees. The boatman says: the cost will be everything you own plus everything you ever earn from now on. The man is no position to argue, he agrees. The boatman takes him aboard and delivers him to the other side, and demands his payment. The man refuses and offers instead to give him the one dinar standard payment. The boatman drags him before a qâdî and demands payment in full. One would hope that the qâdî would apply the Qur'anic principles and say that the EXCESS (ribâ) charge is harâm, and that while the boatman is entitled to the market value (i.e. one dinar) that in this case charity would be better for him. Such overcharging constitutes ribâ (al-Fadhl) despite the absence of a time element.
Ribâ, as the term is used in the Qur'an, clearly refers to usury. In the hadith it appears to be extended to all forms of overcharging as "having an element of ribâ in them." Such overcharging was made possible by the disadvantaged position of the borrower in the former case and by the withholding of information about market price in the latter case. Discount for cash and surcharge for credit, which are Islamicly permitted are examples of interest and clearly demonstrate that interest and ribâ are not synonymous. Further, there is no distinction between rental for money and rental for non-depreciating land, so that a prohibition of one without a prohibition of the other is a contradiction. Finally, the misidentification of ribâ with interest combined with the common use of unsound currencies permits borrowers to engage in ribâ with impunity. To wit, consider of I wish to borrow a certain quantity from someone which is equal to 100 units of some currency. If interest is prohibited, then I will pay him back in 100 units of this currency one year later. If the currency is sound, he has his principle returned to him (ignoring the fact that I've cheated him of his time preference). But if the currency is unsound, like an Israeli shekel, it may only be worth half of what he loaned me as measured in a sound currency. Now I have robbed him of half the principle, which is undeniably a violation of the Qur'anic injunction.
Of course, if Islamic countries would issue sound currency, then at least this component of ribâ could be removed from time-dependent transactions. The main component of the nominal (as opposed to real) rate of interest in modern economies is the anticipated rate of inflation and that, in economies using paper currency, this rate is dominated by government's tendency to debase the money supply. Neither the Prophet, nor the khulufah rashidûn, nor any other Muslim rulers of the first 400 years of Islam engaged in the fraudulent practice of debasing the money supply, which was a principle reason for the society's dynamism and success [see main paper]. Return to the practice of relying in sound currency would eliminate most nominal interest. Then debates over the legality of interest could center around the small residual which is attributable to time preference.
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[Minaret of Freedom Preprint Series 96-4]
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