THE

END 

MATTERS

WAQF AND CIVIC ECONOMY

Adi Setia

The Importance of History

The Qurʾān commands us to take lesson or advice from the (hi) stories of people who have gone before us: “There is certainly advice (ʿibrah) in their stories for people who have reason.”¹ The great historian and socio-economist, Ibn Khaldūn, entitled his magnum opus, Kitāb al-‘Ibar (The Book of Lessons).² In academia, we all know that knowing the text is not enough, for we must also know the social and historical context in which the text is embedded. Hence, it is simply not enough to know the formal, technical fiqh and legal rules governing waqf,³ but we have also to know both the concrete historical contexts in which those rules arose and were implemenetd as well as the present contemporary contexts in which those rules—and the axiological precepts underpinning them—are to be creatively revived and operationalized again.

      A study of the history of waqf will show that there was a “constant dialogue between the letter of waqf law and socio-economic requirements.”⁴ And as Dr. Aḥmad al-Qāsimī, a former mudīr al-awqāf (Director of Endowments) in Damascus, puts it, “the waqf was never the dead, unchangeable property described by the Orientalists as ‘mainmorte’.⁵ Rather, waqf was a vital, central institution in Islamic society which adapted to the needs of the community in each epoch.”⁶

    The extent to which the current ongoing revival of waqf is to be a creative, anticipative, proactive and systemic one—and thereby preempt it from being hijacked and coopted into the reductionist Islamic finance and banking (IBF)⁷ framework—will largely depend on the extent of our critical understanding of waqf socio-legal history, and the way that history is embedded in the larger socio-economic history of Muslim societies. Many historical case-studies have shown that waqf was the operative economic dimension of civil society in Islam;⁸ i.e., waqf was how civil society was actually practiced in Islam. But what is meant by ‘civil society’?

What is ‘Civil Society’?

The word ‘civil’ and its various cognates, ‘city’, ‘citizen’, ‘civilization’, ‘civic’, etc., which are all derived from the Latin ‘civitas’, originally connote a settled community of a significance size facilitative of complex, organized political and socio-economic life. This is an essentially secular connotation without religious or transcendent undertones, since the basic underlying idea is that human beings are by nature rational, social and sensible enough to eventually come together and agree on some common good for mutual prosperity in the temporal life of this world. Thus the term ‘civil society’ simply refers to a group of people coming together on their own accord and shared sense of mutual responsibility and common values without or even despite the coercive power of the centralizing state or the seductive power of the profit-driven market.

     In constrast, the corresponding term in Arabic, al-mujtamaʾ al-madanī, (Malay, masyarakat madani) connotes, in addition, a religious, transcendent meaning, for the adjective madanī comes from the noun madīnah, which literally means “the place where the religion is practiced.” For Muslims, this meaning was most fully realised in the city of the Prophet—Allāh bless him and grant him peace—and subsequent generations would always look back to that time and that place and that society for eliciting intellectual and practical insights into the nature of the virtuous city (al-madīnah al-fāḍilah).⁹

     Thus civil society must also mean for Muslims as referring to a society whose members, largely on their own accord, organize its private and public life according to Islamic religious norms which set the parameters of virtue and vice. In short, civil society in Islam is both a society of personal conscience and communal solidarity, in which its intellectual, legal and social leadership serves their concrete community rather than the abstract state.¹⁰ If, according to the working definition given by the Center for Civil Society at the London School of Economics, “civil society refers to the arena of uncoerced collective action around shared interests, purposes and values,”¹¹ involving institutional forms distinct from the impersonal, coercive and centralising state, then the institution of waqf has been and shall continue to be the cornerstone for establishing vibrant communities largely socio-economically autonomous, even aloof, from the centralised and centralising political apparatus of the impersonal, or even “impossible¹²,” state.

     In other words, waqf allows creative space for communities to micro-manage their own socio-economic affairs in relative autonomy according to the divinely sanctioned ethical norms they believe in as a matter of individual, personal conscience, instead of surrendering their communal responsibility to the disembedded coercive state, which should instead, by virtue of its central authority, focus on establishing and nurturing the macro-framework for this communal responsibility to be realised to the fullest extent possible. Civil society as operationalised in Islamic civilizational history has allowed for the fruitful integration of the mosque and the market, of the private and the public, of the spiritual and the material, and of the individual and the communal¹³ . As a matter of fact, it can be said that civil society in Islam is a living, existential realization of the ethico-legal precept of farḍ al-kifāyah, or the duty of sufficing the community.¹⁴ 

Waqf and the Civic Economy

There has been much talk for sometime both in popular and academic discourse about civil society and what it means in theory and in contemporary practice. Much detailed, useful research has also been done on various manifestations of civil society in the historical (and even pre-historical¹⁵) experience of diverse civilizations and cultures.¹⁶ In the modern context, discussions about civil society have also led to considerations of alternative socio-economic frameworks to the presently dominant neoliberal capitalistic set-up in which manipulated market forces and one-sided commercial exchange geared toward overly individualistic private gain are given undue preference over communal, non-market¹⁷ mechanisms of socio-economic solidarity.¹⁸

      Waqf studies have consistently demonstrated that the Islamic economic system is inherently and self-consciously civil societalin nature, geared to socio-economic equity for the common good, whereby private interest (maṣlaḥah nafsiyyah) is seamlessly integrated into the larger public interest (maṣlaḥah ʿāmmah) leading to what may be called an economy of the common good.¹⁹ Given that the dominant neoliberal capitalist system²⁰ now aggressively promoted throughout the world behind the slogan of globalization is systemically anti-civil societal in nature, current waqf discourse amongst Muslim intellectuals and activists dovetails very well with the growing discourse in the West on alternative economic paradigms that put people and communities and their ecosystems back into the center of socio-economic thinking and planning.²¹

      I believe that waqf thinkers and actvists should familiarize themselves with the thinking and with the thinkers and activists behind the rise of this new “common good” economic agenda²² in the West and find common ground with them, especially given the fact that the waqf system in history has also been cross-denominational and cross-cultural; waqfs have been set up by and for non-Muslims.²³

     Given what we know about waqf and its operationalization in vibrant, cosmopolitan Islamic societies prior to the age of global European hegemony,²⁴ I believe the people now actively involved in the ongoing revivification and revitalization of waqf have to think carefully and systemically about the nature of the macro-economic system implied and entailed by the institution of waqf and in which it is to be embedded.

      We can ask ourselves whether we want to take either a narrow or comprehensive view about waqf, namely: (i) does waqf serve merely as a superficial, formal legalistic alternative to the modern western secular institution of the charitable trust?; (ii) can waqf provide a systemic/structural alternative to neoliberal privatization²⁵ ?; or (iii) does waqf entail a macro economic frame work called the gift or civic economy²⁶ which runs counter to the global dominance of neoliberal capitalism²⁷ lead by free floating, rootless transnational corporations largely disembedded from the livelihoods of local communities? 

      If we take the narrow view, then waqf is only of technical, legalistic interest, only a “hollow pragmaticism,” a formal, operational variance, for the most part, to the secular charitable trust, which itself is largely an ad hoc appendage to an over-arching neoliberal macroeconomic framework having little or nothing to do with the ethos of autonomous, community-based philanthrop in which social welfare and communal solidarity are served rather than undermined by the (actually not-so-free) market.²⁸ 

     If we take the comprehensive or holistic view then we will have to situate waqf within the larger context of integrative Islamic economic ethics and muʿāmalah (science of transactions).²⁹

    In other words, we have to adopt a holistic vision of waqf as an integral part of a comprehensive alternative socio-economic package; we cannot take waqf without taking along the total package in which it is inextricably embedded, just as we cannot separate the frog from the pond. If we do that, then we reduce waqf to a mere technical, legalistic form without realising its profound moral and socio-economic substance, and hence the change from the secular charitable trust to Islamic waqf will largely just be a change in name and not in content, in which case we shall be repeating the mistake of Islamic Banking and Finance (IBF) in its systemic preference for the legalistic contractual forms over the substance of socio-economic equity.³⁰ We are not saying that the form is not important, for indeed it is; but we are saying that the legalistic form must always be in the service of and expressive of the underlying socio-economic ethico-moral objectives. In other words, formal Fiqh serves the substantive Ādāb and Maqāṣid of the Sharīʿah. 

      In talking about the socioeconomic substance of waqf, I think we may do well to revisit briefly the meaning of the term ‘economy’. The word, of Greek provenance, originally means household management (tadbīr al-manzil), or the management of the family, as distinct from ethics (personal management=akhlaq/tadbīr al-sakhṣ/ tadbīr al-nafs) and politics (management of the city=siyāsah/tadbīr al-madīnah).

      In household management, the over-riding concern of the head of the household is the prudent management or stewardship of the resources and income and expenditure of the household so as to provide for the needs of all members, humans and non-humans, of the household. In a typical household, relatively more concern is devoted to the care and provision of the needs of the disabled and the weak (babies, children, the elderly, the handicapped), while the less dependent and independent members (grown-ups and the able bodied) are pretty much left alone to fend for themselves and even contribute to the overall economy and general well-being of the household.

      Now, the city and the country as a whole can be seen as an extended household in which the head is called the government, and the same principle of relatively more concern for the weak (i.e., the poor and the disadvantaged of the population) applies here as well too. Through waqf we have a largely decentralised, community-based economic system, called the ‘market-welfare’³¹ system, whose prime concern was ultimately the systemic provisioning out of private commercial surplus for public services and for the needs of the poor and disadvantaged, thus realising the true purpose of ‘economics’ as a science, and of the true meaning of the ‘economy’ as an extended household, which ultimately entails stewardship of the earth as a whole as the over-arching macro-household.³²

Conclusion

In my view, ulama, fuqaha, muftis, academicians, researchers, entrepreneurs, thinkers and activists involved in the current global revival of waqf should be self-consciously aware of this original meaning and purpose of economics and the economy, namely an economics and an economy of the common good. This awareness would lead to a systemic re-definition of economics away from the standard neoliberal capitalistic one of scarce natural resources chasing after unlimited human wants,³³ which, needless to say, is a contradiction in terms; for how can what is scarce chase after and catch up with what is unlimited? This conventional, dogmatic and untenable definition in effect renders economics not only a “dismal” but also an impossible science. Rather, instead of scarcity we shall have abundance,³⁴ and instead of unlimited wants, we shall have the satisfaction of living within our means, thus the alternative definition of economics proposed here:

Economics is the study of the provisioning and sharing, by mutual giving and receiving,³⁵ of natural and cultural abundance for realising material and spiritual well-being.

     This definition is conceptually rooted and derived from classical Islamic philosophical, ethical and legal thinking about the economic life—charity, trade, commerce, contractual transactions, earning and livelihoods—all within a framework of the imperative of symbiosis between individual good and common good, or the cultivation of right livelihood for the common good. This classical thinking is well summarized by Imām al-Ghazālī in his Kitāb Ādāb al-Kasb wal-Maʿāsh (recently translated as The Book of the Proprieties of Earning and Living).³⁶ It is interesting to note in this regard that the classical Islamic understanding of economics and the economy outlined above dovetails very well with the growing concern in the West for re-embedding the market into a transcendent ethical framework, as evident in the work of E. F. Schumacher, Small is Beautiful,³⁷ and lately amd most notably, Charles Eisenstein, Sacred Economy.³⁸

 

 

This is a reworked and abridged version of the paper originally published as “ Waqf, Civil Society and Civil Economy,” in AWQAF, vol. 18 (2010), pp. 13-38. AWQAF is the biannual journal of the Kuwait Public Awqaf Foundation. Dr. Adi Setia is currently an associate professor at the Center for Advanced Studies on Islam, Science and Civilization (CASIS), Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia; email: adisetiawangsa@gmail.com.

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1. Yūsuf: 111.

2. Ibn Khaldun, The Muqaddimah: An Introduction to History, 3 vols. trans., Franz Rosenthal (Princeton, 1967); an online version, http:// marxistnkrumaistforum.files.wordpress.com/2013/11/the-muqaddimah.pdf.

3. Waqf is the formal institution of charitable endowment in Islam.

4. Miriam Hoexter, Endowments, Rulers and Community: Waqf al-Ḥaramayn in Ottoman Algiers (Leiden: Brill, 1998), p. 141. An online version in pdf format is accessible at http://marxistnkrumaistforum.files.wordpress. com/2013/11/the-muqaddimah.pdf.

5. A French term, rooted in medieval church and fuedal history, which basically means “the incapacity of selling possessions or estates,” see, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mortmain and “Mortmain,” Catholic Encyclopedia (New York: Robert Appleton Company,1913).

6. Cited in Hoexter, Endowments, Rulers and Community, p. 141n.127.

7. A very good critique of IBF is Mahmoud el-Gamal, Islamic Finance: Law, Economics and Practice (NY: Cambridge University Press, 2006).

8. See for instance, Miriam Hoexter et al, eds., The Public Sphere in Muslim Societies (SUNY, 2002), especially, pp. 65 ff.

9. Syed Muhammad Naqib al-Attas, “Islam: The Concept of Religion and the Foundation of Ethics and Morality,” in his Prolegomena to the Metaphysics of Islam: An Exposition of the Fundamental Elements of the Worldview of Islam (Kuala Lumpur: ISTAC, 2001), p. 43n3; cf. Muhsin Mahdi, Alfarabi and the Foundations of Islamic Political Philosophy (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2001). Cf. The useful discussion in Muhammad Khalid Masud, “Civil Society in Islam,” http://www. maruf.org/?p=57. And for the development of law in such a society, see Yasin Dutton, The Origins of Islamic Law: The Qurʾān, the Muwaṭṭaʾ and Madinan ʿAmal (Curzon, 1999).

10. See, e.g., Yasin Dutton, The Origins of Islamic Law: The Qurʾān, the Muwaṭṭaʾ and Madinan ʿAmal (Curzon, 1999); Ovamir Anjum, Politics, Law, and Community in Islamic Thought: The Taymiyyan Moment (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012); cf. Wael Hallaq, The Impossible State: Islam, Politics, and Modernity’s Moral Predicament (Columbia University Press, 2012).

11. See its Report on Activities, 2005-2006 at http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/29398/1/ CCSReport05_06.pdf.

12. Wael B. Hallaq, The Impossible State: Islam, Politics, and Modernity’s Moral Predicament (New York: Columbia University Press, 2012).

13. On the idea of the civil and the civic in the Islamic context, see the excellent analysis by Mohammed A. Bamyeh, “Civil Society and the Islamic Experience,” in ISIM Review, no. 15 (Spring 2005), pp. 40-4 handle/1887/16962/ISIM_15_Civil_Society_and_the_Islamic_Experience.pdf?sequence=1.1; accessible online at: https://openaccess.leidenuniv.nl/bitstream/

14. Adi Setia, “Fard Kifayah, Mu‘amalah, and the Commonweal: Reconnecting Economics and the Economy to Communities,” in Islamic Sciences (Summer 2013), pp. 83-96.

15. Eg., Marshall Sahlins, Stone Age Economics (Aldine, 1974); also John Gowdy, ed., Limited Wants, Unlimited Means: A Reader on Hunter-Gatherer Economics and the Environment (Island Press, 1997).

16. Eg., the book series published by Tufts University Press, Civil Society: Historical and Contempory Perspectives, http://www.upne.com/series/CSS.html.

17. Non-market is not anti-market; it is simply outside or autonomous of the market.

18. See Bruce R. Sievers, Civil Society, Philanthropy, and the Fate of the Commons (Tufts University Press, 2010).

19. See Adi Setia and Mahdi Lock, trans., Right Livelihood and the Common Good: Three Classics from the Islamic Tradition (Kuala Lumpur: IBFIM, 2013).

20. Islam is for capital without being capitalist, just as it is for the social without being socialist. This should be stated lest readers read this article as a diatribe against private capital and personal enterprise.

21. For the case of the economics of agriculture, see the important book by Thomas A. Lyson, Civic Agriculture: Reconnecting Farm, Food, and Community (Tufts University Press, 2004).

22. Such as Herman Daly and John B. Cobb Jr., For The Common Good: Redirecting the Economy toward Community, the Environment, and a Sustainable Future (Beacon Press, 1994); cf., “Can We Create an Economy for the Common Good,” in The Guardian, http://www.theguardian.com/sustainable-business/values-led-business-morals- economy-common-good. See also Economy for the Common Good, https://www.ecogood.org/en.

23. Paul Stibbard et al, “Understanding Waqf in the World of the Trust, ”in Trust and Trustees, vol. 18 no. 8 (2012), pp. 785-810 (http://beneficgroup.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2012/09/Understanding-the-Waqf-in- the-World-of-the-Trust.pdf); see also the good overview by SamiulHasan, “Wakfs (Waqfs),” in International Encyclopedia of Civil Society, eds. Helmut K. Anheier et al (Springer, 2010), pp. 1630-1633, especially p. 1632.

24. Janet Abu-Lughod, Before European Hegemony (Oxford, 1991).

25. For the case of Malaysia, see Jeff Tan, Privatization in Malaysia: Regulation, Rent Seeking and Policy Failure (Routledge, 2008); see also A. H. Schwartz, The Politics of Greed (Rowman and Littlefield, 2006); also, Nik Heynan et al, eds., Neoliberal Environments: False Promises and Unnatural Consequences (Routledge, 2007).

26. Marcello Palazzi et al, “Beyond Market and State: The ‘Civic’ Economy,” http://www.progressiofoundation.org/documents/NewPCES1.pdf. See also the book, A Compendium for a Civic Economy: What the Big Society Should Learn from 25 Trailblazers (London: 2011); http://library. uniteddiversity.coop/Money_and_Economics/Compendium_for_ the_Civic_Economy.pdf.

27. In the context of a nation like Malaysia, economic neoliberal policies often take the form of what is called ‘crony capitalism’; see “Our thCrony Capitalism Index,” in The Economist, March 15 2014; http:// www.economist.com/news/international/21599041-countries-where-politically-connected-businessmen-are-most-likely-prosper-planet.

28. In economic neoliberalism, charity is an afterthought, to be compelled by the state through taxes, or so-called CSR (corporate social responsibilty) whereas in the Islamic Gift Economy, charity (or rather, being charitable) is salient and intrinsic in socio-economic exchange.This undermining of community happens when markets are manipulated to subvert community solidarity and cultural identity. For some good discussions, see Mark Martinez, The Myths of the Free Market: The Role of the State in a Capitalist Economy (Stirling, VA: Kumarian Press, 2009); and Kenneth Friedman, Myth of the Free Market (New York:Algora, 2003). Muslims will have to revisit the concept and practice of the market, as well as globaliztion in Islamic history, but that’s another story.

29. See Adi Setia, “Mu‘āmalah and the Revival of the Islamic Gift Economy,” in Islam and Science (Summer 2011); idem, “The Islamic Gift Economy: A Brief Conceptual Outline,” Waqf Academy, http://waqfacademy. org/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/Dr.-Adi-Setia-AS.-Date.-IGE.-A-brief-conceptual-outline.-Malaysia.-INSPEM.pdf; and idem, “Waqf and the Revival of the Islamic Gift Economy” Waqf Academy, http:// waqfacademy.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/Dr.-Adi-Setia-AS.-12_12_2010.-WAQF-The-Revival-of-the-IGE.-Singapore.-Dr.-Adi-Setia.pdf.

30. On IBF’s preference for legalistic contractual forms over socioeconomic substance see the careful discussion in Mahmoud A. El-Gamal, Islamic Finance: Law, Economics, and Practice (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009).

31. Relli Shechter, “Maket Welfare in the Early-Modern Ottoman Economy: A Historiographic Overview with Many Questions,” in Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient, 48: 2 (2005), 253-276. He says (on page 254): “By welfare through the market (or market-welfare), I mean an economic system that partially stifled competition (and efficiency/growth) for the sake of economic stability and a certain level of equity for those established within its boundaries.”

32. Further discussion in Yassine Essid, A Critique of the Origins of Islamic Economic Thought (Leiden: Brill, 1995); Adi Setia, “Jaʿfar ibn ʿAlī al-Dimashqī on Community, Money, and Prudent Management in Trading and Spending: Four Excerpts from His Kitāb al-Ishārat ilā Maḥāsin al-Tijārah,” in Islam and Science (Summer 2011), 11-32.

33. This basic definition, which is focused on the concept of scarcity, and expressed in various formulations by subsequent economists has been influential since Lionel Robbins proposed it in 1932; see Lionel Robbins, An Essay on the Nature and Significance of Economic Science (London: Macmillan, 1932), p. 15. For a good critique, see Charles Eisenstein, “Permaculture and the Myth of Scarcity” (http://charleseisenstein.net/permaculture-and-the-myth-of-scarcity/).

34.For a good elaboration, see Wolf gang Hoeschele, The Economics of Abundance: A Political Economy of Freedom, Equity and Sustainability (Gower, 2010).

35. Even market exchange is, from the Islamic ethico-legal point of view or analysis, is mutual giving and receiving of beneficial goods and services of relevance and value (the very essence of a ‘gift’, but in this case with consideration).

36. Trans., Adi Setia (Kuala Lumpur: IBFIM, 2013).

37. Harper, 1989: http://sciencepolicy.colorado.edu/students/envs_5110/small_ is_beautiful.pdf.

38. Sacred Economy: Money, Gift and Society in the Age of Transition Evolver, 2011: http://sacred-economics.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/sacred-economics-book-text.pdf.

REFLECTIONS ON MONEY AND FAIR EXCHANGE¹

by Adi Setia²

(This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.)

A note to readers: These reflections arose out of email exchanges between myself and a number of people in our informal networks concerned about reviving classical mu‘amalah in a spirit of close, creative engagement with modern economics and finance. The original discursive tone of these exchanges have been largely retained with minimal editing for clarity and grammatical refinement.

1. I think it is very important not to turn the dinar-dirham movement into a cultish one controlled, defined and certified by a particular group of Muslims, even if that group has done a lot in pioneering the Ummah’s return to the concept and practice of true, real money of intrinsic worth and value.

2. The first thing we should all understand in this regard is that the dinar and dirham coins are “certified” not by any third party (i.e., third to the immediate two parties to an exchange) calling itself the Murabitun or World Islamic Mint, or KGT or Wakalah Nusantara or whatever, but by the very fact of the intrinsic physical amount of gold or silver that that coin contains, regardless of its provenance (i.e., the minter or issuer). That standard intrinsic physical amount of 4.235 grams of pure gold for the dinar, and 2.9645 grams of pure silver for the dirham is already well-defined by the Shari‘ah in the classical books of fiqh,³ not by any particular shaykh or amir or Muslim group, otherwise that would amount to in effect a private monopoly on the minting and the supply of those dirhams and dinars. That means that a silver bar of say 30 grams of any provenance would be physically equivalent to approximately 10 dirhams in weight of silver and thereby it can be exchangeable for 10 standard dirham coins or 10 dirhams’ worth of goods or services.

3. So in an Islamic marketplace, all gold and silver, in coin or bullion form or even in nugget form, can be accepted as money in principle and can be exchanged into standard dinar and dirham coins mithlan bi mithlin by weight. During the time of the Salaf, before dinars and dirhams were standardised into coins by the caliphs, people would weigh their gold or silver money (in coin or bullion or even nugget form) before paying for purchases or services. Of course, standard coins minted by a responsible transparent minter/issuer will render exchange easier, and if some one can come out with a good table to list the “exchange ratio” between different gold and silvers coins of different standards or between coins and bullion, that would be a great service to the Ummah. In this regard, any Muslim community can set up a community waqf mint (CWM) and mint their own dirhams and dinars according to Shar‘i standards. In the community waqf marketplaces, there can be an official sayrufah or money-changer to facilitate conversion of paper money or non-standard coins into the standard coins for trading in the marketplace. This way, transactions in the marketplace will be much simplified and facilitated since all market participants (buyers and sellers) will be using standard coins of standard weights. 

4. So, even if dirham A was bought for RM 25 in paper money, while dirham B for RM 2 in paper money, in the Islamic market place dirham A would still be physically equivalent to dirham B in weight and hence in value, so a chicken can be bought for either dirham A or B or even for a nugget of silver of the same weight as the dirham.

5. This means we need to slowly build up a community market ecosystem in which everything bought and sold therein can be priced directly in standard dirham or dinar, without needing to express the price in paper money terms first. This can be easily done based on the generally accepted local market benchmark of say 1 dirham = 1 good fat chicken, and 1 dinar = 1 good fat goat, and from there people can eventually work out the relative prices of other goods and services in terms of dinars and dirhams, i.e., relative to the various goods and services themselves and relative to the dirham and dinar. This will also lead to the eventual establishment of a vibrant community gold and silver market for coins, bullion, and rough uncast gold and silver nuggets.

6. Hence, any responsible community organization (NGO, Muslim Village, Waqf Board) guided by a learned faqih (learned in classical adab and fiqh of mu‘amalah) can mint the dirham and the dinar based on the standards already set out clearly in the four schools of fiqh (say the Shafi‘i school in the case of South-east Asia), and these coins would be recognised by other like-minded communities and interchangeable with other dirham and dinar coins minted by other communities. In this way, the dirham and dinar can be both a community and an inter-community money and currency.

7. Eventually, what we really need is not the World Islamic Mint or other self- proclaimed “global” and large opaque body, but a local or regional association or society of autonomous but informally networked community dirham-dinar minters/issuers to faciliate convergence on best practices, best technology, and best standards/quality, and so on and so forth, guided by a board of fuqaha of the four schools who are in turn nominated by their communities to serve on the board. These community fuqaha and muftis can work in tandem with like-minded lawyers, accountants and business professionals to further facilitate this careful and well-informed transition into a dinar and dirham economy.

8. In general, since the dinar-dirham project is in the interest of the public and common good of the Ummah as a whole (maslahah ‘ammah) and not in the interest of any particular individual, businessman, shaykh, tariqat or jama‘ah, it is best for communities to set up waqf or public foundation structures for minting the dinar and dirham coins, whose organizational and funding structure, cash flow, accounts and balance sheets are published on their websites for public scrutiny. This transparency (nush) will in turn generate a healthy culture of trust, professionalism, accountability and reponsibility.

9. Also, in communities who find it difficult for various reasons to have access to gold or silver as money, they can have a money system based on, or backed by, say rice or cooking oil or a basket of local commodities, at least for local exchange purposes, as well as set up a form of netting off mechanisms to settle balances of payments at the end of a trading period (especially between businesses trading with one another), hence even a small amount of gold or silver or rice or oil can support a large volume of exchange.

10. Also, we have to bear in mind that money in Islam must have intrinsic physical value, and this intrinsic physical (‘ayni) value is independent of whatever extrinsic purchasing value/power it may acquire in the marketplace; hence absolute physical value is independent of relative market value. More on this and related issues will be elaborated, in sha Allah, in a paper (tentatively entitled, “The Concept of Money in Islam”) defining the Islamic view on the meaning of the terms ‘medium of exchange’,‘store of value’ and ‘measure of value’ that figure in the modern standard and also classical definitions of money.

11. Finally, the dinar and dirham is only a small though vital component of the total ecosystem of Islamic exchange called mu‘amalah, hence every community should institute regular teaching and training programs in all aspects of mu‘amalah that have been laid out so clearly in the classical texts on the adab and fiqh of mu‘amalah, iktisab and infaq in all the four madhhabs or schools of Islamic Law. 

WaLlāhu aʿlamu bi mā yuṣību al-ḥaqqa wa al-ḥaqīqah.

Thank you. Feed back welcomed. Wassalam.

 

1. Paper specially prepared for the One-Day Intensive Course on “The Adab & Fiqh of the Islamic Market,” organised by UNRIBA and CASIS, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, October 24 2014.

2. Associate professor, CASIS-UTM, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

3. eg., in the case of the Shafi‘i school of Islamic Law, see Nuh Ha Mim Keller, Reliance of the Traveller, p. 873 ff for more details.

THE

END

MATTERS

EXAMINING THE META-PRINCIPLES OF MODERN ECONOMICS

AND THEIR IMPLICATIONS FOR ISLAMIC BANKING AND FINANCE

 

Yusuf Jha

 Abstract: The foundational principles of modern neo-classical economics, as of other disciplines of the social sciences, have been influenced by the overall trajectory of post-enlightenment, secular, humanistic thought and its epistemological roots such as rationalism, methodological individualism and the assumed supremacy of the scientific method as a way of evaluating all forms of knowledge. This paper contends that an Islamic economics and finance bereft of analyzing and addressing these principles has inadvertently reinforced the very same problematic structures it originally intended to replace.

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Keywords: Economics; epistemology; Islamic Finance; Islamic Economics; post-enlightenment thought; scientific rationalism.

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 There is no such thing as philosophy-free science; there is only science whose philosophical baggage is taken on board without examination. (Daniel Dennett)¹

 

Introduction

The Islamic tradition, like the other major religious traditions, places a great deal of emphasis on vision, intention and direction. The Qurʾānic query So where then are you headed? (Q 81:26) harkens the reader to constantly examine one’s motives and assumptions with regards to the ultimate goals being pursued in any endeavor. This intricate interplay between means and ends is of vital importance, particularly in examining the role of any social or natural science, with economics being no exception. Far from exclusively being an Islamic proposition, the noted economist E.F. Schumacher has alluded to this imperative in his book Small is Beautiful, highlighting that all economics is derived from a larger instructive paradigm of meta-principles. It was Schumacher’s position that a viable alternative to what he considered the materialist excesses of modern economics would best be served by a faith-based paradigm. Though he highlighted Buddhism as an illustrative example in the landmark fourth chapter of his book, he noted, “The choice of Buddhism for this purpose is purely incidental; the teachings of Christianity, Islam or Judaism could have been used just as well.”²

       The foundational principles of the economic system that Schumacher was keen to replace had been well-secured in the centuries preceding him. This paper seeks to outline the intellectual and historical genealogies of these principles, for they are directly relevant to any debate concerning the meaning, content, and purpose of Islamic Economics and Islamic Finance, as well as the correctness or otherwise of their subsequent direction.

Aftermath of Colonization

Through the advent of the colonization of Muslim lands, most of the Islamic world was brought into a Western-imposed economic order for which it was ill-prepared. This resulted in the systemic unravelling and destruction of its traditional socio-economic structures and institutions. Consequently, most of the institutions with relevance to finance that exist today in the Muslim world, such as capital markets, corporations, etc., find hardly any antecedent in classical Islamic civilization. Likewise, contemporary perspectives and new understandings in regards to matters of wealth creation, debt, risk, etc., are all characterized by an ethos and belief seemingly alien to much of the Muslim and medieval world. Arguably, the “great western transmutation”³ that so revolutionized political, economic, social, and human relations in the middle ages never occurred in the Muslim world.⁴

       As a result, accompanying decolonization, the last four or five decades have seen an attempt in the Muslim world to return to Islam, with scholars and academics attempting to recast economics and other social sciences into the light of Islam’s normative principles. Arguably, however, such stated ideals have achieved little success in terms of their realizations. Scholars such as Nasr assert that the theoretical works of Islamic economics “failed to escape the centripetal pull of western economic thought,” and have instead “been caught in the intellectual web of the very system it set out to replace.”⁵

Intellectual Failure of Islamic Economics

The contention that Islamic economics has failed is based on the view that this project was derailed at the outset itself, by not successfully unpacking the epistemological and socio-historical foundations of modern economics (its undepinning meta-principles), and subsequently failing to transform them in accord with Islam’s normative positions. According to Syed Naquib al-Attas, this is the key to any successful “Islamization of knowledge”; namely that the philosophical foundations underpinning that knowledge be critically recast into the Islamic metaphysical and axiological framework. As Al-Attas points out with reference to science in general:

We do affirm that religion is in harmony with science. But this does not mean that religion is in harmony with modern scientificmethodology and philosophy of science. Since there is no science that is free of value, we must intelligently investigate and study the values and judgments that are inherent in, or aligned to, the presuppositions and interpretations of modern science. We must not indifferently and uncritically accept each new scientific or philosophical theory without first understanding its implication and testing the validity of values that go along with the theory.⁶

        In a spirit of supporting this endeavour, this paper posits that the meta-principles of modern economics are best traced back to post-enlightenment thought that arose in Western Europe. It was the enlightenment period and its subsequent general direction, referred to by some as “technicalistic progress,”⁷ which marked a path that Western Europe was to adopt from the seventeenth century onwards. In general, this was marked primarily by a transition from religious to secular thought, and a shift in societal structure through previous ‘traditional’ societies morphing into ‘rational’⁸ ones. Scholars such as Foucault note this period as when ‘man’⁹ first emerges within the field of western knowledge. In his book the Ascent of Humanity, Charles Eisenstein argues that it was this period that saw the definitive articulation of the ‘Scientific and Technological Program’, referred to by him as the defining myth of modernity.¹⁰

        Through time, the ancient maxim¹¹ of Protagoras (500 BCE) received renewed vigor, culminating in what Nietzsche referred to as the “Death of God,” heralding the arrival of ‘rational man’ and eventually ‘economic man’ (homo economicus’).¹² As Eisenstein has noted, though the process would involve various stages, it was arguably the great names of the Scientific Revolution—Galileo, Newton, Descartes, Leibniz, Bacon, who in their definition and quantification of motion, matter, energy and force, would go onto eventually provide the conceptual and methodological underpinnings that would help set into place what he refers to as the “objectification of nature.”¹³ Over the course of the next three centuries this process would go on to gradually dominate practically all mainstream fields of academic knowledge (with economics being no exception).

The Meta-Principles of Scientific Knowledge

This paper asserts the key elements of post-enlightenment scientific knowledge as follows: 

Emphasis on the secular and an eradication of a sense of the sacred.

 The trajectory of thought from the enlightenment era onwards can be arguably seen as an ever-increasing separation from the Divine. The physics of Galileo, Descartes, and Newton implied that with the new laws of motion, everything keeps moving by itself through rational, natural laws. Thus, with motion objectively extrinsic to and transferred between objects, God was no longer seen as necessary to animate the world. Descartes and others proposed that animals are machines too, that no inner anima, no spirit, is needed to animate them either. God was thus removed from the world of matter, becoming, in a parable of the time, a watchmaker God, with creation becoming a discrete act existing almost independently of Divine agency. What thus remained, for Descartes in his Discourse on Method, was for man to master these rules and become the “lords and possessors of nature.”

Emphasis on naturalistic determinism.

The scientific method also assumes determinism, namely that the same initial conditions will result in the same intermediate and terminal conditions. Thus nature has to be ruled by a rigid naturalistic determinism, with everything, in principle, being predictable, akin to a giant clockwork machine inexorably going through its predestined motions. This is why the machine model was the dominant metaphor of science, and anything not seen like that was regarded as unscientific: the eye was a camera, the heart a pump, and (later) the brain a computer.

Emphasis on rationalism and empiricism, with a subsequent exiling of qualitative and subjective experience from the definition of knowledge.

In distinguishing between primary and secondary qualities, Galileo arguably laid the foundations for modern empiricism: namely that reality is limited to what can be measured quantitatively, and it is only through the channel of empirical science that access to ‘reality’ can be gained. This issue was later taken up in philosophy by David Hume in his becoming one of the pillars of modern empiricism, when he stated: “Let us ask, Does it contain any abstract reasoning concerning quantity or number? No. Does it contain any experimental reasoning concerning matter of fact and existence? No. Commit it then to the flames; for it contains nothing but sophistry and illusion.”¹⁴ Just as the subjective was sought to be eliminated, increasing efforts were expended to quantify the qualitative. In Newton’s universe, objects were reducible to a mass interacting through impersonal, deterministic laws. So sounds were reduced to sine waves, visual experience to pixels, and ultimately emotions to electro-chemicals. The behaviorism of the mid-twentieth century as embodied through Pavlov’s experiments sought to explain the ‘technology of behavior’ and served as a prelude to today’s psychiatric medication drugs that explain emotions in the context of serotonin and various other chemical imbalances.

Separatism and dualism with subsequent emphasis on reductionism in the study of nature.

As Cartesian dualism allowed the entire universe to be seen as a mere aggregate of mutually disconnected objects of perception, reductionism followed. To the scientific method, uniqueness was/is an illusion, since all objects are merely different permutations of identical, generic protons, neutrons, and electrons. At its most basic level, the scientific program requires two examples of a single element to be identical. An electron is an electron. The same goes for a proton, a neutron, and thus everything built from them—all atoms, all matter. This is why at a broad level, biology is reduced to chemistry and the 92 (and counting) chemical elements are (successfully) further reduced to simple subatomic particles, which are then at the quantum level further reduced (not so successfully) into various subatomic forces. Today we are constantly told that physicists are closing in on a Unified Field Theory that would reduce these particles, again, to just so many permutations of something even more fundamental. This is the deep philosophy permeating the quest to reduce all we know to a few basic building blocks, the constant search for the elusive ultimate sub-atomic particle that will finally serve as the missing link in finalizing the “Theory of Everything.” 

A culmination of the foregoing features as a quest for the absolute control of nature and the effective deification of man.

 In an ultimate sense, the quest of reductionism could be said to be a quest for perfect control. As one of its more famous proponents, Michio Kaku, has said, “An equation one inch long…would allow us to read the mind of God....Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from divinity.”¹⁵ Thus, to its proponents, perfect deterministic, reductionist knowledge suggests the possibility of perfect control, and perfect control is tantamount to being Divine, and thereby replacing God with man himself. 

How did these Meta-Principles influence Economics?

As a result of the above, intellectual discipline in Western Europe was increasingly sought to be defined through secular, value-neutral and materialist perspectives. The more rational and empirical the distinct form of knowledge, the more prestige was proportionally assigned to it. Thus special importance was accorded to Newtonian physics, primarily because it was deemed the most precise in the reductionist order of things. Eventually, just as using a few basic laws of motion for bodies and particles Newtonian physics was able to present a unified treatment and description of a large number of seemingly unrelated and chaotic natural phenomena, similarly efforts were made to use reductionist laws to explain a variety of societal complexities within the social sciences, economics being no exception. 

       Historians of economic thought such as Mirowski¹⁶ maintain that the founders of neoclassical economic theory imported the mono-utility approach from nineteenth century physics in an attempt to impose a “unity of analytical tools”¹⁷ between the disciplines. He maintains that “Neoclassical economic theory is bowdlerized nineteenth century physics....Present research techniques may be favoured because they were appropriated from physics....neoclassicism was not ‘simultaneously discovered’ because it was ‘true,’ instead, the timing of its genesis is explained by the timing of the energetics revolution in physics, and by the fact that scientifically trained individuals in different Western European countries at that time had access to the same body of knowledge and techniques.”¹⁸ Later authors, such as Olson,¹⁹ also document the prestige accorded to Newtonian physics and the subsequent effort to model the social sciences along similar lines, thereby further reducing them to physics and mathematics.

      The intent of the founders of modern neoclassical economics, such as Leon Walras, who, in his Elements of Pure Economics, claimed that “the pure theory of economics is a science which resembles the physico-mathematical sciences in every respect,”²⁰ is evidently corroborative of Mirowski’s thesis. The writings of early neoclassical economists, including Wilhelm Launhardt (1832-1918), Rudolf Auspitz (1837-1906), Richard Lieben (1842-1919), Vilfredo Pareto (1848-1923), and Irving Fisher (1867-1947), are ubiquitous in appropriating metaphors from physics and mathematics into theories of economic science. As such, neoclassical economics as it emerged began to strip itself free of the normative moral value judgements previously emphasized by Aristotelian and Judeo-Christian thought, culminating in its formal identification as a ‘scientific’ discipline after the 1890 publication of Alfred Marshall’s treatise Principles of Economics.²¹

      With a continual emphasis on equating economics with more empirical and quantitative sciences such as physics, key concepts of conventional economics emerged in the form of rationality²², maximization of utility²³, positivism²⁴, laissez-faire,  econometrics,²⁵ and the ‘invisible-hand’ of ‘free’ market forces.²⁶ Despite ongoing debate, these concepts largely provide the meta-principles that frame the conceptual and structural parameters of the modern market economy today.

Just what is wrong with these principles?

When we review the epistemological foundations of modern neoclassical economics and its subsequent core meta-principles, it is perhaps not coincidental that Schumacher sought to contrast them with those embodied by religious principles. Today’s ‘science’ of economics, based on the interaction of self-interested individuals in a world of scarcity, and given over to the ideals of perfect competition, essentially opposes the communal bases of pre-modern or faith-based economies. 

      Nowhere is this more evident than in seeing how the reductionism and rationality of neoclassical economic theory coupled with the Benthamite utility’ of money count the consumption and destruction of natural resources ‘as income and economic growth. As Eisenstein notes, “ In terms of conventional economics, it may actually be in an individual’s rational self-interest to engage in activities that render the earth uninhabitable. This may be potentially true on the collective level as well.”²⁷ Elsewhere, Diwany²⁸ and Eisenstein illustrate how using the exponential nature of future cash flow discounting indicates that “it may be more in our ‘rational self-interest’ to liquidate all natural capital right now—i.e., cash in the earth—than to preserve it for future generations.” As Eisenstein says, “After all, the net present value of an eternal annual cash flow of one trillion dollars is only some twenty trillion dollars (at a 5% discount rate). Economically speaking, it would be more rational to destroy the planet in ten years while generating income of $100 trillion, than to settle for a sustainable level of $3 trillion a year forever.”²⁹ So here, we have notions of rationality and insanity turned on their heads.

       Far from being an abnormality, the scale at which such short-term thinking permeates mainstream economic ‘rationale’ can be illustrated by statements such as those of Yale professor William Nordhaus, who is reported to have said, “Agriculture, the part of the economy that is sensitive to climate change, accounts for just three percent of national output. That means there is no way to get a very large effect on the US economy.”³⁰ Similar sentiments and rationales are echoed by the Oxford economist, Wilfred Beckerman, who said, “Even if net output of agriculture fell by 50 percent by the end of the next century, this is only a 1.5 per cent cut in GNP.”³¹ The error apparent in this and similar statements is that of reductionism, that of reducing the importance of agriculture as an indicator of well being to its percentage of the GNP alone.

      As the above illustrates, despite claiming to be amoral and free from normative assumptions, neoclassical economic theory posits idealizations with regards to a host of factors. Assumptions abound with regards to human welfare and happiness, “perfect” competition and the consumptive capacity of people, much of which is on the opposite side of the narrative to traditional religious positions. In its attempt to imitate Newtonian mechanics, its adoption of Benthamite utility, its focus on an abstract “economic rational man” (homo economicus), disembodied from the social, ethical and political dimensions of things, modern economics has, in its very striving for scientific sophistication and empirical vigor, perversely become increasingly impervious to the very elements of human nature that constitute its subject matter as a social science. It is thus not surprising that modern economics has been associated with the disintegration of family life and blamed as an ideology that has failed to bring peace of mind and inner happiness to humankind, hence it is truly the “dismal science.”³²

     Scholars such as Oswald,³³ Diener and Oshi,³⁴ Myers,³⁵ Lane³⁶ and Layard³⁷ have all documented how vast increases in wealth in Western societies have failed to increase contentment, satisfaction and a sense of wellbeing. Henry George, in his landmark Progress and Poverty, condemned the resultant contrast between wealth and poverty brought about by neoclassical economics:

 So long as all the increased wealth which modern progress brings goes but to build great fortunes, to increase luxury and make sharper the contrast between the House of Have and the House of Want, progress is not real and cannot be permanent.³⁸

    In more recent times, Nobel-laureate Amartya Sen has argued that “the distancing of economics from ethics has impoverished welfare economics and also weakened the basis of a good deal of descriptive and predictive economics,” and that economics “can be made more productive by paying greater and more explicit attention to ethical considerations that shaped human behaviour and judgment.”³⁹

The Faith Position

 To recall Schumacher’s observation, his allusion to the formal faith of Buddhism was encompassing of a broader context of what he considered ‘sacred’.⁴⁰ The recent financial crisis has brought to global attention the various social movements that have arisen in response to it, and they have in a large part been calling for a return to this ‘sacred’ dimension of economics; namely, one that recognizes an inherent uniqueness in all created beings and their connections to the Divine. This is evidenced in the works of counter-economics visionaries such as Charles Eisenstein and Eileen Workman, both of whom are authors of works entitled Sacred Economics, and neither of whom advocate a particular religion or creed in their works. Instead they advocate a state of being with regards to the world that would be consistent with Schumacher’s definition of ‘Traditional Wisdom’⁴¹ and inconsistent with the rationale of homo economicus.

The Role of Islamic Economics

Despite the fact that the Islamic faith like most traditional faiths possesses a distinct worldview that emphasizes the Divine, and the transcendent meaning and purpose of nature, connects the economic dimension of life to higher, wider dimensions, and places the acquisition of material wealth in the service of communal belonging and spiritual advancement, we, nonetheless, have found Islamic economics to be struggling to exorcise itself from the intellectual baggage of western economics.

      This is apparent from the testimonies of the discipline’s leading figures themselves who collectively have almost unanimously expressed disappointment with its lack of direction. Umar Chapra writes, “Islamic economics has been unable to come to grips with...the problems faced by Muslim countries.”⁴² Nejatullah Siddiqi likewise writes that, “All is not well with Islamic economic(s)....The grand idea of providing an alternative to capitalism and socialism...has yielded to a desire to join the flock.”⁴³ More tellingly, Monzer Kahf writes in “Islamic Economics: What Went Wrong”: “It seems to me that the present generation of Islamic economists is exhausted and already consumed in the activities of Islamic banking and finance, that the best it can do is to hand over the torch to a second generation that may carry deeper theoretical analysis and fill the gaps left by our generation.”⁴⁴ Likewise Asad Zaman, in his “Crisis in Islamic Economics: Diagnosis and Prescriptions,” posits that the four fundamental flaws of western economic theories—namely, (i) claim of universality; (ii) mathematical formalism; (iii) materialism; and (iv) the positive/ normative classification of economic knowledge—were all implicitly assumed by Islamic economic theory. He argues that “Muslim economists have uncritically accepted claims that economic theory is ‘positive,’ or factual, and many other methodological assumptions.”⁴⁵

     This “collapse of the grand Islamic agenda”⁴⁶ has been attributed to a lack of holistic thinking that, instead of seeking to critically review and recast underpinning philosophical foundations in the manner Al-Attas has proposed, has become representative of a “type of cultural/folkloristic colouring to Western concepts.”⁴⁷ Nowhere can this said to be more apparent than in the application of Islamic Finance, wherein “The realities of financial markets which prioritize economic incentives rather than religious behavioral norms has forced Islamic finance to become part of the international financial system...the difference has been reduced to technicality, and the value system is no longer mentioned beyond describing the prohibition of riba by quoting verses in the Qurʾan.”⁴⁸

The Need for a New Approach

By not utilizing an analysis that is holistic—namely, one that is structural and looks at the synthesis of means and ends, direction, etc.—and adopting one that is reductionist, partial, fragmented, or bracketed from the larger, non-economic context, Islamic economics and Islamic finance have chosen the wrong direction, which is in turn the result of a flawed vision of what economics and the economy are all about. The current narrow conceptualisation of Islamic economics as just being interest-free banking and finance with zakat as a condiment thrown into the hybrid mix, misses the affirmation of the central principle of Islam, namely tahwīd (the Unique Oneness of God), which demands integration of body, mind, and soul on our part in submission to the Divine Unity. It is this principle that defines the raisond ’êtreofman’ sexistence, being his recognition and acknowledgement of this Unity, and that in turn shapes the individual and collective psyche with regards to economic behavior in respects of its myriad outcomes and expressions in various structures and institutions. This revitalized approach may already be underway.

     The recent financial crisis that witn essed gigantic, mega-trillions “bailout” packages raised from public money given to the very banks at the root of the crisis has seen in its wake an emerging, community-rooted mass movement to rethink the whole function of a true economy. This has resulted in a fervor for alternative economic structures and financial institutions that are more community rooted, directed and oriented, that partake in and contribute to movements of ecological and cultural awareness, and that create a supportive financial environment that decreases and even eliminate our dependence on debt instruments. Many of these proposed solutions are in harmony, at least in spirit, with similar Islamic initiatives of traditional, community-centered socio-economic institutions. Within this remit, new voices have begun to emerge, calling for ways of old to be applied afresh.⁴⁹  

     In his position paper speaking about the “Revival of the Islamic Gift Economy,” Adi Setia describes the Islamic Gift Economy (IGE) as:

an integrative Islamic economic system that is autonomous and can stand and prosper on its own ethical and economic principles while in constructive engagement with current neo-liberalism, instead of one that is co-opted, wittingly or unwittingly, into the mainstream, free-market capitalist system, as is largely the case with what currently goes by the name of Islamic Banking & Finance.⁵⁰

    Through pioneering, largely informal collaboration with scholars, professionals, friends, and colleagues in Malaysia, Singapore, UAE, and elsewhere, Setia, in place of the current obsession with Islamic Banking and Finance (IBF) approach, has instead been motivating and organizing various efforts to set up community-rooted and directed business enterprises to wean people away from dangerous dependence on banks and corporations. Instead of centralised and largely monopolistic mega-IBF corporations and the current disembedded banking industry in general, he argues for establishing: 

1. focusing solely on muḍāraba and mushāraka, based on direct. Decentralised Islamic community investment companies, people to people (P2P) micro-investments. 

2 focusing solely on waḍīʿa, providing safety deposit, storing and Decentralised Islamic community depository companies, warehousing services for a reasonable, fair fee. 

3. Islamic community payment (or clearing or netting-off) system, focusing on ḥawāla and payment clearing and netting- off services for facilitating trade and commerce, money transfers, and offering debit cards and checking services. 

4. A waqf based takāful system to spread local community risk. 

    Most of all, in his opinion, there is a great need for community fuqahāʾ, academicians, and scholars to teach people both the adab and fiqh of muʿāmala (ethics and legal rules of transactions) in a proactive discursive context of critical engagement with current economic theories and practices, so that they can once again actualise a world of right livelihood for the common good.

    Such initiatives rooted in localism and community solidarity are supported and complemented by other endeavours by other thinkers and activists, such as permaculture design, community currencies, gift economics, negative interest money system, public co-operative interest-free banking, community land trusts, gold dinar and silver dirham money system, community supported agriculture, crowd funding and investing, and open community markets. All these myriad but complementary efforts currently challenge the hegemonic nature of the interest based financial system as opposed to normalizing it with liberal use of Islamic terminology in the case of IBF.

    This paper has contended that it is time the misuse and corruption of terms such as ‘Islamic’, ‘muʿāmala’, ‘sharīʿa’, ‘tamwīl’ and ‘maqāṣid’ are highlighted and countered. This can only happen when the meta-principles that Islam advocates are systemically brought to the fore and those of the system it seeks to replace are removed. It is only then, that we, as Islamic economists, may be able to formulate a proper and effective response to the Qurʾān’s question: So where then are you headed? (Q 81:26).

 

 

Yusuf Jha is a Chartered Sharia Auditor and Advisor formally certified by the Accounting and Auditing Organization for Islamic Financial Institutions, currently working for Abu Dhabi Islamic Bank as a Manager in charge for Sharia Consultation and Documentation. Having received formal training in Islamic wills and inheritance tax and investment planning in the UK, he is qualified as a UK Chartered Independent Financial Advisor. Email: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

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1. Daniel C. Dennett, Darwin’s Dangerous Idea: Evolution and the Meanings of Life (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1996).

2. E.F. Schumacher, Small is Beautiful: Economics as if People Mattered (New York: Harper Perennial, 1989), 55.

3. See M.G.S. Hodgson, The Venture of Islam: Conscience and History in a World Civilization, vol. 3: The Gunpowder Empires and Modern Times (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1974), 44-71.

4. Alongside Hodgson, this was also the position of many orientalists such as Bernard Lewis in his Islam and the West (New York: Oxford University Press, 1993), 183.

5. S.H. Nasr, Man and Nature: The Spiritual Crisis in Modern Man (Chicago: Kazi Publications, 2007), 388.

6. S.M.N. Al-Attas, Islam and Secularism (New Delhi: Hindustan Publications, 1984), 114.

7. Hodgson, Venture of Islam, vol. 3, 176-222. Hodgson describes the term ‘technicalization’, as being “a condition of calculative (and hence innovative) technical specialization, in which the several specialties are interdependent on a large enough scale to determine patterns of expectation in the key sectors of a society.” He chooses to distinguish between the term ‘technicalization’ and ‘industrialization’, in viewing the latter as being only one aspect of the whole process.

8. Hodgson defines a rational society as one in which, “choices can be determined less by the dictates of ancestral custom and more by practical calculation of immediate advantage.” In keeping with Benthamite utility, he defines it as one in which, “Immediate efficiency will be valued more highly than continuity with the past, and people will therefore be less hesitant about change lest it prove degenerative.”

9. M. Foucault, The Order of Things: An Archaeology of the Human Sciences (London: Routledge, 2005), in the preface of which he states, “But as things become increasingly reflexive, seeking the principle of their intelligibility only in their own development, and abandoning the space of representation, man enters in his turn, and for the first time, the field of Western knowledge.”

10. C. Eisenstein, The Ascent of Humanity: Civilization & the Human Sense of Self (Berkeley, CA: Evolver, 2013), wherein he cites the modern “myth” of the “ascent” of man as being one from the depths of ignorance and powerlessness into the light of scientific reason and mastery. He contends this myth as being premised on two parallel “mythical” stories: a Scientific Program promising complete understanding and a Technological Program promising complete control. Together, in essence, these Programs encapsulate the defining myth of our civilization, namely that: “ Science will find an answer and Technology will find a way.”

11. “Man is the measure of all things: of things which are, that they are, and of things which are not, that they are not,” as quoted in Theaetetus by Plato, section 152a.

12. Readings of Nietzsche’s works indicate that it was not an attempt to say God does not exist or that “God dies” but was instead a metaphorical assertion that God as understood in Christian Western Europe was culturally, historically, and/or sociologically no longer relevant. As such, his primary concern was historical, that of demarcating a new epoch in human existence; saying less about God, or of a conception of God, and more about culture and history. In that light Nietzsche’s comments are an admission that effectively presupposes the effectiveness of the ‘rational’ assault on Christianity as having permanently altered the direction of those societies, thereby creating a historical landmark after which things would never be the same again; a landmark he chose to refer to as being the equivalent of God’s dying.

13. At its root, the Scientific Method assumes that there is an objective universe “out there,” that we can query experimentally, thus ascertaining the truth or falsity of our theories. With nature being a self-subsistententity that can be encapsulated exhaustively in the quantitative formulae of natural sciences, this then leads into other key assumptions of which reductionism and determinism are among the key components.

14. An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding, Part II, 1748.

15. “The Universe in a Nutshell,” http://www.floatinguniversity.com/kaku-transcript.

16. P. Mirowski, Physics and the Marginal Revolution, Cambridge Journal of Economics (1984), 361-379.

17. Ibid.

18. Ibid., 377.

19. R. Olson, Science Deified and Science Defied: The Historical Significance of Science in Western Culture (Berkeley: University of California Press, 990).

20. L. Walras, Elements of Pure Economics (London: Routledge, 2003), 71. In this book Walras explains in great detail how “pure economics” in a manner akin to “pure science” is only concerned with the relationship of things, namely “the play competition”; see his account of the blind and ineluctable forces of nature, such as the “pure relationships” in a regime of “perfect competition” in Chapter 4. Walras demanded the same application of mid-nineteenth century physics to economics, and revealed this so-called ‘unity of technique’ in his later article “ Économique et Mécanique,” wherein he posited that utility is a measurable quantum akin to physical energy.

21. J. Schumpeter, A. History of Economic Analysis (New York: Oxford University Press, 1996), 21.

22. The preference of many economists to seek analogies in physics and its natural laws was at play in the equating of rationality with the serving of self-interest through the maximization of wealth and want satisfaction, thereby allowing for the drive of self-interest to be referred to as the “moral equivalent of the force of gravity in nature”; see M.L. Myers, The Soul of Modern Economic Man: Ideas of Self-Interest, Thomas Hobbes to Adam Smith (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1983).

23. Just as by using one law of motion for particles Newton was able to present a unified treatment of a large number of apparently unrelated phenomena, economists sought to adopt the maximization of utility as the sole acceptable principle of explanation for human behavior. As such, explanations of human behavior which take into account motivations other than selfishness or greed were not to be considered acceptable by modern mainstream economists, though in recent times the emergence of other perspectives such as institutional economics and behavioral/experimental economics have challenged this dominant methodology.

24. Positivism in the conventional economic sense of being “entirely neutral between ends” or “independent of any particular ethical position or normative judgment,” was entirely consistent with the element of reductionism in natural sciences, i.e., incontending that all “ processes are reducible to physiological, physical or chemical events.”

25. Owing to the prestige of mathematics and physics as being value-free, economics was conceived of as being a set of natural laws, amenable to analysis by mathematical models, thereby displacing socio-historical qualitative analysis as an equally valid approach to the subject.

26. The ‘invisible hand’ as coined by Adam Smith was intended to illustrate how an individual through pursuing his self-interest would be able to, with the conjunction of the forces of perfect competition and supply and demand, serve a greater social need through allowing for an allocation of resources in society.

27. See Charles Eisenstein, “Money and the Turning of the Age,” accessed online at http://www.realitysandwich.com/money_and_turning_age.

28. T.E. Diwany, The Problem With Interest (London: Kreatoc, 2003), 13.

29. Eisenstein, “Money and the Turning of the Age.”

30. W. Nordhaus, Science (September 14, 1991), 1206.

31. W. Beckerman, Small is Stupid: Blowing the Whistle on the Greens (London: Duckworth, 1995), 91.

32. R. Easterlin, “Will Raising the Income of All Increase the Happiness of All?,” Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization 27, no. 1 (2001), 5-48.

33. A. J. Oswald, “Happiness and Economic Performance,” Economic Journal 107, no. 445 (April 1997), 1815-31.

34. E. Diener and S. Oishi, “Money and Happiness: Income and Subjective Well-being Across Nations,” inE. Diener and E.M. Suh, eds., Subjective Well-being across Cultures (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2000).

35. D.G. Myers, “The Funds, Friends and Faith of Happy People,” American Psychologist 55, no. 1 (2000), 56-67.

36. R.E. Lane, Loss of Happiness in Market Economies (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2001).

37. R. Layard, Happiness: Lessons from a New Science (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 2005).

38. H. George, Progress and Poverty (New York: Robert Schalkenback Foundation, 1997).

39. A. Sen, On Ethics and Economics (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1987).

40. Schumacher says, “The reign of quantity celebrates its greatest triumphs in the Market. Everything is equated with everything else. To equate things means to give them a price and thus to make them exchangeable. To the extent that economic thinking is based on the market, it takes the sacredness out of life, because there can be nothing sacred in something that has a price,” http://neweconomicsinstitute.org/content/small-beautiful-quotes.

41. To quote Schumacher, “Everywhere people ask: ‘what can I actually do?’ The answer is as simple as it is disconcerting. We can, each of us, put our inner house in order. The guidance we need for this work cannot be found in science or technology, the value of which utterly dependson the ends they serve; but it can still be found in the traditional wisdom of mankind,” http://neweconomicsinstitute.org/content/small-beautiful-quotes.

42. U. Chapra, The Future of Economics: An Islamic Perspective (Leicester: The Islamic Foundation, 2000), 375.

43. M.N. Siddiqi, “Obstacles to Research in Islamic Economics,” Proceedings of The Seventh International Conference on Islamic Economics, Islamic Economics Research Center, KAAU, Jeddah, April 1-3, 2008, http://islamiccenter.kaau.edu.sa/7iecon/English/English%20 Contents.htm

44. M. Kahf, “Islamic Economics: What Went Wrong,” Paper presented at the Islamic Development Bank Roundtable on Islamic Economics: Current State of Knowledge and Development of the Discipline, Jeddah, May 26-27, 2004.

45. A. Zaman, “Crisis in Islamic Economics: Diagnosis and Prescriptions,” JKAU: Islamic Economics 25, no. 1 (2012), 147-69.

46. Siddiqi, “Obstacles.”

47. V. Neinhaus,“Islamic Economics: Policy between Pragmatism and Utopia,” Economics, Tubigen 25 (1982), 80-100.

48. M. Asutay, “Conceptualisation of the Second-best Solution in Overcoming the Social Failure of Islamic Banking and Finance: Examining the Overpowering of Homo Islamicus by Homo Economicus,” IIUM Journal of Economics and Management 15, no. 2 (2007), 167-95.

49. A. Setia, “Muʿāmala and the Revival of the Islamic Gift Economy,” Islam & Science 9, no. 1 (Summer 2011), 67-88.

50. Ibid.; see also his “Farḍ al-kifāya, Muʿāmala & the Commonweal: Reconnecting Economics and Economies to Communities,” Islamic Sciences 11, no. 1 (Summer 2013), 83-96.

Al-GHAZāLī ON THE PROPRIETIES OF EARNINGG AND LIVING:

INSIGHTS AND EXCERPTS FROM HIS KITāB āDāB AL-KASB WAL-MAʿāSH

FOR REVIVING ECONOMIES FOR COMMUNITIES

ʿAdī Setia

Al-Ghazālī’s important Kitāb Ādāb al-kasb wal-maʿāsh (The Book of the Proprieties of Earning and Living) constitutes Book Three of the Quarter on the Norms of Daily Life from his celebrated magnum opus Iḥyāʾ ʿulūm al-dīn (The Revivification of the Sciences of Religion).A reflective reading of this work provides valuable insights into the integrative socio-axiological vision underpinning all commercial transactions and economic activities in Islam, leading to a succinct re-definition of economics as “the science of earning and provisioning” (ʿilm al-iktisāb wa al-infāq), and thereby doing away with the current obsession with and anxiety over scarcity in chasing after wants.

Keywords: Common good, communities, earning, economics, al-Ghazālī, Iḥyāʾ ʿUlūm al-Dīn, iktisāb, infāq, kasb, Kitāb Ādāb

al-kasb wal-maʿāsh.

---

Wealth increases not through perfidy, just as it decreases not through charity.

                                            —al-Ghazālī

Preamble

Many Muslim business people take honesty in commercial transactions for granted. This is because they imagine ‘honesty’ to be a simple concept to understand and thereby to practice. Simple to understand, maybe—though even that is subject to further scrutiny—but easy to practice?

          As Imam al-Ghazālī makes clear in his Kitāb Ādāb al-kasb wal-maʿāsh (The Book of the Proprieties of Earning and Living),¹ if working and business people do not properly learn and apply the science of earning and provisioning (Arabic, ʿilm al-iktisāb wal-infāq; Malay, ilmu mencari hidup dan memberi nafkah), most of them would actually end up in the lying, cheating, and deception business without even realizing it. Hence, it is most important for them to thoroughly understand the art of doing business and transacting in its ethical, legal, pragmatic, and, most importantly, eschatological dimensions. Al-Ghazālī also embeds individual or personal good into the common good, and commercial profit into the attainment of felicity in the Afterlife, leading thereby to a vision of the end of the economic life as ensuring the common well-being of all in the life of this world and their ultimate salvation in the life of the Hereafter. 

        His book provides, in a succinct volume, an integrative ethico-legal vision for the proper conduct of commercial exchange and earning a living in general. This is a vision which has earlier been articulated by, inter alia, al-Shaybānī (132–189/729–804) in his Kitāb al-Kasb,² al-Muḥāsibī (165–243/781–57)³ in his al-Makāsib,⁴ al-Khallāl (234–311/849–923) in his al-Hathth ʿalā al-tijāra,⁵ Ibn Abī al-Dunyā (208–281/823–894) in his Iṣlāḥ al-māl,⁶ Abū Ṭālib al-Makkī (d. 386/996)⁷ in his Qūt al-qulūb,⁸ al-Rāghib al-Iṣfahānī (d. 443/1060)⁹ in his Dharīʿa¹⁰ ; and later by al-Dimashqī (fl. 6th /12th cent.) in his al-Ishāra,¹¹ al-Qurṭubī (d. 671/1273) in his Qamʿ al-ḥirṣī,¹² and al-Lubūdī (ca.900/1500) in his Faḍl al-iktisāb.¹³ Al-Zabīdī (1145–1205/1732–1791),¹⁴ in his Itḥāf sādat al-muttaqīn,¹⁵ a multi-volume commentary on the Iḥyāʾ, can also be said to have given due consideration to the topic.

       These and other similar classical texts constitute what may be called the kasb ethico-juristic genre in Islamic economic thought, providing for discerning readers a clear vision and understanding of the proper relationship between detachment (zuhd) from worldly wealth and engagement in the seeking of it kasb), and helping them to come away more enlightened about the meaning, function, and purpose of working for a living (kasb/iktisāb/takassub), the imperative of wholesome sources of incomes and revenues (ṭīb al-maksib), the moral obligation to avoid, even denounce, whatever is illicit (ḥarām/maḥẓūr) and of doubtful provenance (shubha), and the fine distinction between provisioning (infāq) and squandering (isrāf/tabdhīr), and thereby contribute more effectively to the positive flourishing of themselves and their communities.

        Kasb (also iktisāb or takassub) in this context simply means working for a living, or earning a livelihood, by means of commerce, craft production, farming, or hiring out one’s services, or by any other legitimate and ethical means. It is also about what to do with what you have earned: how to spend and indeed invest your income, profit, or revenues in provisioning (infāq)¹⁶ for your own livelihood, for the livelihoods (maʿāsh, maʿīsha) of your dependents, and for the wellbeing of your community, instead of squandering those incomes away in dissipative living (isrāf) or for wealth accumulation for its own sake. It is about how to organize or manage (tadbīr) all of that effectively and prudently, with strict adherence to the ethico-juristic parameters of ensuring justice (ʿadl) and practicing magnanimity (iḥsān), as well as showing sincere concern for the religious life (al-shafqa ʿalā al-dīn), for the commercial enterprise must always serve the higher personal, social, and eschatological goals of the faith. In short, the merchant¹⁷ is to realize that he is at once conducting commerce in the market of the world as well as in the market of the Hereafter (sūq al-ākhira), and transacting with both people as well as with the Creator of people.¹⁸ Indeed, the concept of ʿamal ṣāliḥ (“good work”¹⁹) is not limited in its practical expression to observing the private domain of personal devotions like the prayer or fasting, but has its ramifications too in the public domain of both formal and informal economic exchange.

The Kitāb Ādāb al-kasb wal-maʿāsh²⁰

In this book²¹ of the Iḥyāʾ, Imam al-Ghazālī (d. 505/1111)²² elucidates the proper relationship or harmony between working for a living in the life of this world and working for salvation in the life of the Afterlife. In this regard he divides people into three groups: (1) those who pursue the life of this world (al-maʿāsh) at the expense of their life to come (al-maʿād), and these are the people of perdition (al-hālikūn); (2) those who devote themselves to worship for the sake of their Afterlife while forgoing their livelihoods in the life of this world, and these are the successful (al-fāʾizūn);²³ and (3) those who are occupied with their livelihoods in the life of this world for the sake of their salvation in the life of the Afterlife, and these are the people of the golden mean (al-muqtaṣidūn). As is quite apparent in the book, al-Ghazālī is primarily concerned with espousing the proper conduct (ādāb) of the people of the golden mean²⁴ in regard to the manner of their work, earning, and livelihoods.²⁵

       The rank of the golden mean (rutbat al-iqtiṣād) will not be attained so long as the proper procedure (manhaj al-sadād) is not adhered to in the seeking of one’s livelihood; and the seeking of this world cannot be raised to a means (wasīla) and an expedient towards the Hereafter so long as the seeker fails to discipline himself with the discipline of the Revealed Law (yataʾaddab ṭālibuhā bi ādāb al-sharīʿa). And so here we expound on the proprieties of commercial dealings and the [practice of the trades and] crafts (ādāb al-tijārāt wal-ṣināʿāt), and the various kinds of earnings (ḍurūb al-iktisābāt) and their norms (sunanihā).²⁶ 

       He divides the book into five chapters, namely (1) on the merit (faḍl) of and exhortation (ḥathth) to earning a living; (2) on the science of valid business contracts, transactions, and dealings; (3) on the meaning and practice of justice (al-ʿadl) in transactions; (4) on the meaning and practice of magnanimity or benevolence (al-iḥsān) in business dealings; and (5) on the merchant’s showing sincere concern (shafqa) for his soul and his service to the religious life.²⁷ In the first chapter, after presenting various verses of the Qurʾān, Prophetic hadiths, traditions of the Companions, and anecdotes of the Predecessors exhorting people to work for their livelihoods, he goes on to discuss in some detail some of the special circumstances in which certain people can be excused from working and rely on the public treasury for their support.

 However, abandoning working is better for four types of people: the devotee who is devoted to bodily devotions (al-ʿibādat al- badaniyya); a person observing some inner [spiritual] wayfaring (sayr bil-bāṭin) and practice of the heart (ʿamal bil-qalb) pertaining to the sciences of the [spiritual] states and unveilings (ʿulūm al-aḥwāl wal-mukāshafāt); a scholar occupied with cultivating exoteric knowledge (ʿilm al-ẓāhir) from which people can derive benefit in their religious life, such as the jurisconsult (al-muftī), the exegete (al-mufassir), the scholar of prophetic traditions (al-muḥaddith) and others like them; and a person occupied with taking care of the wellbeing of Muslims (maṣāliḥ al-Muslimīn) and responsible for their affairs, such as the ruler (al-sulṭān), the judge (al-qāḍī), and the court witness²⁸ (al-shāhid). These people, if they are sufficed from out of the wealth allocated for the public interest, or charitable endowments (al-awqāf) established for the poor and the scholars, then their attention to what they are doing [for the public good] is better than occupation with earning a living.²⁹

He concludes the first chapter by saying:

These then are the virtues of earning a livelihood. It behooves that the contractual agreement (al-ʿaqd) by which this earning is realized fulfills four conditions: validity (al-ṣiḥḥa), justice (al-ʿadl), magnanimity (al-iḥsān), and concern (al-shafaqa) for the religion.³⁰

At the beginning of the second chapter, he writes that every person who engages in buying and selling, or other forms of business dealings or working for a living, is obliged to learn the “science of earning” (ʿilm al-kasb): 

Know that the acquirement of the knowledge of this topic is obligatory on every Muslim earner (muktasib),³¹ for the seeking of knowledge is an obligation on every Muslim. Indeed this is knowledge that is needed, and the earner is in need of the science of earning (al-muktasib yaḥtāj ilā ʿilm al-kasb). And when he has acquired knowledge of this topic, he will be able to pause³² at practices that corrupt transactions (mufsidāt al-muʿāmala) and guard himself against them. And as for whatever that is anomalous (mā shadhdha) from among the problematic technicalities [of transactions] (al-furūʿ al-mushkila), and one is confronted with the cause of their ambiguity,³³ then he should be scrupulous concerning them and enquire.³⁴ This is because if he does not know in general³⁵ the causes of corruption [of transactions] (asbāb al-fasād) then he will not be aware when he is obliged to pause and to enquire [about them of the scholars].³⁶ 

        He then goes on to narrate the Caliph ʿUmar b. al-Khaṭṭāb’s statement, None trades in our market³⁷ except those who know [the] jurisprudence³⁸ “of [trade] (lā yabiʿ fī sūqina illā man tafaqqaha),³⁹ ” and presents for treatment in some detail six of what he considers to be the most prevalent types of transactions amongst business people, the basic legal rules of which they must learn—namely, sale (al-bayʿ), usurious gain (al-ribā), buying in advance (al-salam), hiring and renting (al-ijāra), business partnership (al-sharika), and venture capital financing (al-qirāḍ). At the end of this second chapter, which is the juristic (fiqhī) core of the whole treatise, he says:

This is the measure of knowledge of the jurisprudence [of transactions] that every earner (muktasib)⁴⁰ is obliged to learn lest he should intrude into the unlawful (al-ḥarām) without even realizing it.⁴¹

Moreover, since business dealings usually involve the use of money (gold dinars and silver dirhams) as a means of exchange and a measure of value, he speaks out strongly against the witting or unwitting circulation of counterfeit money, and ruled it obligatory on the merchant to “learn [the science] of money” (taʿallum al-naqd) so that he may thereby guard himself against shortchanging people. Hence, in the third chapter, dedicated to “justice in transaction,” he says:

it is obligatory on the merchant to learn about money (taʿallum al-naqd), not for his self-interest per se, but [also] so that he can avoid giving [even] a counterfeit coin to a Muslim out of heedlessness, lest he should be sinful due to his shortcoming in learning this science of money. Since for every vocation there is a science by means of which one can discharge the [the duty of] giving good counsel to Muslims (nuṣḥ al-Muslimīn), then acquiring it is obligatory. It is because of issues like this that the Pious Predecessors (al-salaf) acquired the science of knowing the characteristics of [good] money out of concern for their religion rather than for their [personal profit in this] world.⁴²

    He begins the fourth chapter by detailing the relationship between justice and magnanimity in transaction, which is basically that the merchant will be in a greater position to observe justice in his transactions with people if he were at the same time to make it a point to observe magnanimity.

Allah Most High has commanded us to observe justice (al-ʿadl) and magnanimity (al-iḥsān) together. Justice is a means to salvation (al-najāh) only, and it functions just as capital functions in commerce.⁴³ Magnanimity is a means to success (al-fawz) and to the attainment of felicity (al-saʿāda), and it is comparable to profit in commerce. A person is not considered to be among the intelligent if he is content with merely maintaining his capital in the transactions of this world, and so likewise [the case] in the transactions of the Hereafter. Hence, the religious person (al-mutadayyin) should not limit himself to merely observing justice and avoiding injustice (al-ẓulm) while altogether overlooking the imperatives of showing magnanimity.... We mean by ‘magnanimity’⁴⁴ the doing of that by which the transactor [buyer or seller] derives benefit even though it is not mandatory on one to do so, but rather as a goodwill (tafaḍḍul) on one’s part.⁴⁵

In the fifth and final chapter, on showing concern for the religion, al-Ghazālī is chiefly concerned with the fact that the merchant should always be conscious of the eschatological dimension of mundane commercial life, such that the seeking of daily sustenance in the life of the world becomes inseparably integrated into the seeking of everlasting felicity in the life of the Afterlife. In this way, a merchant’s concern for his short term material gains is never in spite of his concern for his long term spiritual gain, but rather the former becomes a part and parcel of the latter, and thereby the commercial is embedded into the spiritual, and becomes one with it.

It does not behoove the merchants to be occupied with their livelihood (maʿāsh) at the expense of their life to come (maʿād), lest they should squander their lives away and suffer a bad bargain (ṣafqa khāsira). What he loses of profit in the Afterlife cannot be compensated by what he gains from this world, and he will be among those who buy the worldly life with the Afterlife (ishtarā al-ḥayāt al-dunyā bil-ākhira). Rather, it behooves the intelligent to show concern (al-shafqa) for his soul (nafs), and his showing concern for his soul is by preserving his capital, and his capital is his religion and his commerce in it. Some of the Predecessors have said, “The things most appropriate for the intelligent person are those most required for him over the short term, and the things most required for him over the short term are those most praiseworthy with respect to their consequences over the long term”.... Allah Most High says, And do not forget your portion of the world (Q 28:77), that is, do not forget while you are in this world [to prepare] your portion of it for the [sake of your salvation in the] Afterlife,⁴⁶ for the world is the seed-bed of the Hereafter, and in it you earn your good deeds (al-ḥasanāt).⁴⁷

As elaborated by al-Ghazālī, this concern for the religious imperative in earning a living is operationalized through, inter alia, (i) wholesome vision and intention by which one abstains from beggary and covetousness through one’s economic independence, and thereby be in a position to provide for one’s dependents; (ii) giving good counsel to people with whom one transacts, and to desire for them the good one desires for oneself; (iii) cooperating through one’s vocation in contributing to the common good, by means of which the needs of the community are met; (iv) being steadfast in one’s religious devotions and mindful of them, and avoid allowing oneself to be distracted by commerce from the perpetual remembrance of God; (v) being scrupulous, not only with respect to what is obviously unlawful, but also with respect to what is of doubtful provenance; (vi) and holding oneself to account for “all the avenues of one’s transaction with every single one of whom he transacts with.”⁴⁸

One should keep a keen eye on all avenues of one’s transaction with every single one of those whom he transacts with, for he is being watched (murāqab) and taken to account (muḥāsab), so that he should prepare his response on the Day of Accounting and Penalty (yawm al-ḥisāb wal-ʿiqāb) in respect of his every deed and word, as to why he embarked boldly on them, and for what reason. Indeed, it has been said that the merchant shall be made to stand firmly on the Day of Resurrection with every person to whom he had sold something, and he shall be held to account fully for [his dealing with] every single one of them to the number of those with whom he had transacted [in the life of this world]. One of them said, “I saw one of the merchants in my sleep, and so I said to him, ‘What has Allah done with you?’ He said, ‘Fifty thousand scrolls [of accounts] were unrolled for me.’ I said, ‘Were these all sins?’ He said, ‘These were transactions with people, to the number of every person with whom I had transacted in the world. Each person had his own individual scroll regarding everything between me and him, from the very beginning of his transaction [with me] until its very end.’”⁴⁹

    On the whole, al-Ghazālī shows that the legal forms of the commercial contracts must serve the ethical substance of the exchange between the parties involved, which is justice, magnanimity, and the common good. This ethico-moral vision is based on the governing precept that one should desire for his brother what he would have desired for himself in similar circumstances. Since life in this world is the seedbed of the life to come (al-dunyāmazraʿatal-ākhira),⁵⁰ it behooves the merchant and all who are working for a living to be constantly aware of the eschatological dimensions of trade, commerce, and industry. The governing goal here is that the acquiring of profit in this temporal life should also lead to the acquiring of profit in the eternal Afterlife, and that the latter profit is the one that really matters in the final analysis. Thus he ends his treatise with these words:

Therefore this is what is incumbent on the earner [to be cognizant of] in his work in respect of what pertains to justice, magnanimity, and concern for the religion. If he limits himself to [observing] justice, then he is from among the upright (al- ṣāliḥūn). And if he appends magnanimity to that, then he is among those who are brought near (al-muqarrabīn) [to Allah]. And if, in addition to that, he seriously takes into account [and attends to] the service of the religion, as we have mentioned in the fifth chapter, then he shall be among the truthful (al-ṣiddīqīn). And Allah is the Most Knowing of what is sound.⁵¹

Some Insights from the Kitāb Ādāb al-kasb wal-maʿāsh 

Detachment and Engagement (ʿibāda and muʿāmala)

The governing idea here is that the more you are engaged with the world, the more you have to be detached from it. So, paradoxically, engagement entails detachment, indeed demands it in order for that engagement to realize its positive objectives instead of deteriorating into self-destructive attachment. Thus one reads classical kasb and iktisāb books and comes away with the profound realization that the operative test of true abstinence and prudence—or true inner worth and spiritual discipline in general—lies in the very way one conducts oneself through the every-day trials, tribulations, temptations, worries, and vexations of working for one’s sustenance, whether by trading in goods and merchandise, working for a wage, farming, or practicing a craft.

      In a nutshell, a person is prudent and abstinent when he takes care to work in a wholesome enterprise (al-kasb al-ṭayyib) in order to provide for his needs and the needs of his family and dependents, and, if there is surplus, to provide (infāq) therefrom for the poor and needy in his community, while at the same time, avoiding the illicit (ḥarām), the abhorred (makrūh), and the questionable (shubha), and turning away from materialistic covetousness, and from indulging in an overly opulent life-style, so that one may avoid casting rancor into the hearts of the poor and needy. Only then can his whole life be a life of solidarity with the poor, and of total worship in humble devotion to his Creator, to Whom he shall be returned, and to Whom he shall be held accountable for all the blessings and enjoyments bestowed on him in his temporal earthly life. This integrative insight is also nicely alluded to by Imam Muḥammad al-Shaybānī with his statements, “In earning a livelihood there is the meaning of cooperation in acts of devotion” (fī-l-kasb maʿnā al-muʿāwana ʿalā al-qurab),⁵² and “Permissible earning is in the category of cooperation in acts of devotion and obedience” (al-kasb al-ḥalāl min bāb al-muʿāwana ʿalā al-qurab wal-ṭāʿāt).⁵³

     Hence, in order to observe devotions (ʿibāda), we need to cultivate appropriate transactions (muʿāmala) to support and nurture it; the one simply cannot do without the other. This integration is expressed by al-Ghazālī thus:

This was the manner of the commerce of those who engaged in commerce for the sake of seeking sufficiency⁵⁴ (ṭalab al- kifāya), rather than for the sake of opulent living (al-tanaʿʿum) in the world. Indeed, those who seek the world in order to be assisted by it towards attaining to the Afterlife, how could they be disregardful of the profit of the Afterlife (ribḥ al-ākhira) when the market (al-sūq), the mosque (al-masjid), and the home (al-bayt) are for him [governed by] one law⁵⁵ (ḥukm wāḥid), and salvation is only through piousness (al-taqwā)? The Prophet— Allah bless him and give him peace—has said, “Fear Allah wherever you are (ittaqi-Llāh ḥayth kunt).”⁵⁶ The vocation of piety is never suspended for those who are devoted to the religious life, whatever the vicissitudes of their situations. Their life and  their livelihoods are in [the state of] piety, since it is through it that they envision their commerce and their profit. It has indeed been said:

Whosoever desires the life of the Afterlife is prosperous and whosoever desires the life of this world is off course; the imprudent departs and retires in wanton heedlessness whereas the sagacious scrutinizes his soul’s deficiencies.

(wa man aḥabba al-dunyā ṭāsh man aḥabba al-ākhirat ʿāsh wal-aḥmaq yaghdū wa yarūḥu fī lāsh wal-ʿāqil ʿan ʿuyūb nafsih fattāsh)⁵⁷

Livelihood and the Common Good (maʿīsha and maṣlaḥa)

Al-Ghazālī views the economic life as an integration of private interest into the common interest, of the commercial into the moral, of the material into the spiritual, and of worldly life into the Afterlife. Even while we transact with people, at a deeper level and in the final analysis we are transacting with our Creator; and hence we are to be always attuned to Transcendence, that is, to the common good and our higher calling.

The second matter⁵⁸ is to intend, through one’s craft, commerce, or work, the discharge of one of the obligations of sufficiencies (furūḍ al-kifāyāt).⁵⁹ If the crafts and the businesses should be abandoned, the livelihoods of people would be disrupted, and most people would perish [as a consequence]. Therefore the well-ordering of the affairs of all is realized through the cooperation of all (intiẓām amr al-kull bi-taʿāwun al-kull), while each group assumes an occupation. If all of them were to be devoted to a single vocation (ṣināʿa), then the rest of the vocations would be left unattended and people would be destroyed. It is in the light of this reality that some of the scholars have interpreted the saying of the Prophet—Allah bless and give him peace—“The diversity of my Community is a mercy (ikhtilāf ummatī raḥma),” as referring to the diversity of their occupations in the various crafts and vocations.⁶⁰

Here economics is to be seen as an ethico-pragmatic organization of livelihoods for the common good, which must also mean the highest good, which is the attainment of everlasting felicity, since life in this world is but the seedbed of the life in the Afterlife, and the ultimate goal of all human actions on earth must be salvation and felicity in the Afterlife.

Kasb, Infāq, and Redefining Economics

A close reading of this book and others of the genre, which are so very careful to differentiate between ‘provisioning’ (infāq) and ‘squandering’ (isrāf/tabdhīr), brings us to a definition of economics that clearly connects means to ends and integrates the two within a meta-economic vision of the role and function of the temporal life of human beings on earth, their inborn spiritual identity, and their ultimate, eschatological destiny: the “organization of livelihood”—or the “science of earning (kasb, iktisāb) and provisioning (infāq) of livelihood (maʿīsha) for the common good (maṣlaḥat ʿāmma⁶¹)”—whether at the level of the individual and family, or at the level of the community and society. The word ‘economy’ originally referred to “household management” (tadbīr al-manzil)—or rather, household caretaking or stewardship—and the primary duty of the householder is to ensure that the resources and revenues of the household, tangible and intangible, are managed prudently so that the needs, material and spiritual, of all members of the household are well taken care of and provisioned in such a way that none is marginalized, especially the weaker and more dependent members, such as babies, young children, the handicapped, the ill, the elderly, including even pets and animals and plants of the household, and even the very physical structure of the home itself. The idea of social and intergenerational responsibility is also implicit in this understanding of the economic life.

It has been narrated from him concerning the virtue of abandoning hoarding—Allah bless and grant him peace: “price, it is as if he has given it away in charity (taṣaddaqa),” Whosoever imports (jalaba) food and then sells it at the day’s⁶² and in another wording, “it is as if he has emancipated a slave (raqaba).”⁶³

Zayd ibn Maslama⁶⁴ used to cultivate his land, and ʿUmar—Allah be pleased with him—said to him, “You are doing the right thing. Be independent of people, for that will be more protective of your religion and more munificent of you in respect of them, as your friend Uḥayḥa⁶⁵ has said:

Never have I ceased bestowing lavishly on al-Zawrāʾ⁶⁶  For indeed the one of means is munificent to his brethren.

The Prophet—Allah bless and give him peace—was sitting one day with his Companions, and they observed a strong, sturdy youth setting out early to work. They said, “Woe unto this man; would that his youth and strength were spent in the path of Allah.” The Prophet—Allah bless and give him peace—said, “ himself from begging and to be independent of people, then Do not say this; for if he works for himself in order to restrain he is in the path of Allah. If he works for his impoverished parents or for his impoverished children so as to enrich and suffice them, then he is in the path of Allah. If [however] he works for the sake of showing off (tafākhuran) and accumulation (takāthuran) [of wealth], then he is in the path of Satan.”⁶⁷

Ethics, Economics, and Politics

In the classical Islamic system of philosophy, tadbīr al-manzil comes under the division of al-ḥikmat al-ʿamaliyya (practical philosophy), which includes—apart from economics (management of the household)—ethics (management of the self) and politics (management of society).⁶⁸ All three are interconnected, grounded in, and directed by the same core of ethico-moral values and principles. In this mode of thinking, the market aspects and the welfare aspects are both integral, constituent aspects of the same wholesome economy, which in this regard can be termed the market-welfare economy,⁶⁹ or the Islamic Gift Economy (IGE) (al-itqtiṣād al-infāqī), or the “provisioning” economy, or even an economics of charity (al-iqtiṣād al-taṣadduqī), in which profits and surpluses are to be self-consciously and systemically re-invested into the service, promotion, and preservation of communal well-being.⁷⁰

       Hence we read in these classical texts the stern injunctions against any transactions involving usurious gain (ribā), hoarding (iḥtikār), cheating (ghash), deception (talbīs), perfidy (khiyāna), and circulating counterfeit gold or silver coins (tarwīj al-zayf), for all these are seen as injustice and oppression, and thus against the common good, even if these transactions are prima facie valid in regard to their outward contractual forms. In this regard, Imam al-Ghazālī and, following him, Imam al-Lubūdī say:

Know that a transaction (al-muʿāmala) sometimes comes in a form with respect to which the jurisconsult (muftī) rules the transaction to be valid and contracted, but the transaction,  vertheless, implicates some [manner of] oppression (ẓulm)⁷¹ by which the transactor is exposed to the wrath of Allah Most High.⁷² This is because not every prohibition (nahy) entails invalidity (fasād) of the contract (al-ʿaqd).⁷³ This oppression (al-ẓulm) refers to that by which others are harmed (mā istaḍarr bi-hil-ghayr),⁷⁴ and it is divided into that whose harm is of a pervasive nature⁷⁵ (mā yaʾummu ḍararuhu) and that which is particular to the transactors⁷⁶ (mā yakhuṣṣu al-muʿāmil).⁷⁷

   Hence, the transactor, the earner, the merchant or the artisan is to take all the steps, measures and precautions necessary to ensure that their business practices harm neither their business partners or their customers, nor the public at large.

He should not limit himself only to steering clear of what is unlawful, but rather, he should be wary of all the avenues through which doubtful matters creep in (mawāqiʿ al-shubuhāt), and the occasions in which uncertainties prevail (maẓānna al- rayb). He should not look towards the formal juristic rulings (al-fatāwā) but rather he should seek rulings from his heart (yastaftī qalbah),⁷⁸ so that should he find in his heart rancor (hazāza) [towards the thing in question] then it behooves him to avoid it. If someone should carry to him some merchandise whose provenance fills him with misgivings it behooves him to enquire about it so that he may be sure about it lest he should consume what is doubtful.⁷⁹

Integrating Justice, Magnanimity, and Concern for the Religious Life

In addition to the imperative of justice, there is also the imperative of magnanimity, generosity, and empathy, to which both al-Ghazālī and al-Lubūdī devote a special chapter. Both have this to say regarding the relation between justice and magnanimity in commercial dealings:

Allah Most High has commanded us to observe justice (al-ʿadl) and magnanimity (al-iḥsān) altogether. Justice is a means to salvation (al-najāh) only, and it functions just as capital (raʾs al-māl) functions in commerce.⁸⁰ Magnanimity is a means to success (al-fawz) and to the attainment of felicity (al-saʿāda), and it is comparable to profits in commerce. A person is not considered to be among the intelligent if he is content with merely maintaining his capital in the transactions of this world, and likewise in the transactions of the Afterlife. Hence, the religious person (al-mutadayyin) should not limit himself to merely observing justice and avoiding injustice (al-ẓulm) while altogether overlooking the imperative of showing magnanimity. Allah says, And be good (aḥsin) just as Allah has been good to you (aḥsan) (Q 28:77). And He Most Majestic, Most Exalted says, Verily, Allah commands justice and goodness (al-iḥsān) (Q 16:90). And He, Most Glorious, says, Allah’s mercy is close to those who do good (al-muḥsinīn) (Q 7:56). We mean by “magnanimity” the doing of that by which the transactor [buyer or seller] derives benefit even though it is not mandatory on one to do so, but rather as a goodwill gesture (tafaḍḍul) on one’s part.⁸¹

In this emphasis on integrating justice and magnanimity we see a vision of commercial exchange in which both parties are to benefit more or less equally from the exchange (the notion of mumāthala, or fair exchange), such that neither party is being disadvantaged or short-changed in any way. One is even to cultivate the sensitivity of empathy for the other: to put oneself in the other’s shoes, so to speak, to be absolutely transparent, to give good counsel, to charge fair prices, and pay fair wages; and basically, to desire for your business partner or customer or even debtor what you would have desired for yourself in similar circumstances and in similar situations. Indeed, one is to be charitable, giving, and forgiving at all times.

Commercial Exchange as a Special Case of Giving and Gifting

This understanding of the underlying notion of “giving” or “gifting” finds support in Michael Bonner’s careful study of early, pre-Dimashqīan economic thought in Islam as exemplified in al-Shaybānī’s Kitāb al-Kasb.⁸² Here, the corresponding notion is that of a virtuous “circulative exchange” between rich and poor, or an economics of interdependence between rich and poor, in which the surplus of the rich is “returned” (radd, rujūʿ) to the poor in order to maintain order, peace and balance in society,⁸³ especially in urban society. So the “gift” economy is also the “charitable” economy (al-iqtiṣād al-taṣaduqqī) or the “return” economy, in which the circulation of wealth is from the rich to the poor and not from the rich to the rich, so that it does not become something which [only] circulates among the wealthy in your midst (Q 59:7). It is only in the context of this circulative economy that wealth (al-ghinā) is seen as part of health (al-ʿāfiya)—indeed, part of the “common-health.” 

Ayyūb⁸⁴ said, “Abū Qilāba⁸⁵ said to me, ‘Frequent the market,⁸⁶ for independence is part of wellbeing (al-ghinā min al-ʿāfiya).’”⁸⁷ This refers to independence from [asking of] people.⁸⁸

    Here, it is appropriate also for us to cite Shaykh Gibrīl Ḥaddād’s splendid introduction to his masterful translation of Imam al-Khallāl’s important book al-Ḥathth ʿalā al-tijārat wal-ṣināʿa wal-ʿamal:

 Imam Aḥmad liked to cite the great Tābiʿī Abū Qilāba’s pithy summation, “Wealth is part of health” (al-ghinā min al-ʿāfiya)⁸⁹— [which refers to] not just one’s own physical upkeep and mental peace of mind, but that of one’s family and community as well, since it permits mutual aid in times of sickness and bereavement, which is the soul of joint responsibility (takāful). Acquiring and spending wealth licitly, moreover, shows obedience to Allah and His Prophet....al-Khallāl’s work therefore provides a great service to the Umma by reminding people that wealth that is acquired lawfully and put to good use is an avenue of blessings at all levels.⁹⁰

 The Role of the Muftī in Community-Rooted Economies 

Al-Ghazālī writes that people transacting in their work or commerce must learn the basic legal rules governing the validity of some of the more prevalent forms of transactions, as presented in chapter two of his book. More abstruse transactional problems require consulting with legal scholars or jurisconsults (muftīs) qualified to issue formal legal rulings to resolve such problems.

The earner is in need of the science of earning (al-muktasib yaḥtāj ilā ʿilm al-kasb). And when he has acquired knowledge of this topic, he will pause at practices⁹¹ that corrupt transactions (mufsidāt al-muʿāmala) and guard himself against them. And as for whatever that is anomalous (mā shadhdha) from among the problematic technicalities (or, complexities of transactions) (al-furūʿ al-mushkila), and one is confronted with the causes of these problems,⁹² then he should be scrupulous concerning them and enquire.⁹³ This is because if he does not know in general⁹⁴ the causes of corruption [of transactions] (asbāb al-fasād), then he will not be aware when he is obliged to pause and to enquire.⁹⁵

These [elucidations⁹⁶] are adequate for explicating the sale transaction (taʿrīf al-bayʿ), and for bringing attention to what will lead the merchant to be aware of the sources of corruption so that he may seek legal opinion (yastaftī) whenever he is uncertain and confused about anything in respect thereof. But if he is not cognizant of this [science] then he will not be perceptive of the occasions for enquiring and he will thereby plunge into usurious gain and into the unlawful without being conscious of it.⁹⁷

     Here, we only mention this much that one may know by it the major legal rulings⁹⁸(jaliyyāt al-aḥkām), and be astute thereby regarding matters of ambiguity; for to know [these rulings and juristic problems] exhaustively is the vocation of the muftī, not he vocation of the laity.⁹⁹

     The above citations point to the imperative of having qualified, community- rooted muftīs who can, on the one hand, conduct regular courses for ordinary business people on the science of transactions in Islam (ʿilm al-muʿāmala), while, on the other hand, serve as muʿāmala jurisconsults for them. Since everyone who transacts is legally obliged to learn the science of transactions,¹⁰⁰ then by implication, to have a scholar of transactions (faqīh al-muʿāmala) able to teach this science would be a collective obligation on the community. One can even envisage, say, a community Muʿāmala Advisory Council (MAC) on which these muftīs and fuqahāʾ can serve, for the true muftī or faqīh should serve communities rather than monopolistic banks and corporations. If they are also familiar with conventional secular business norms and practices, that would only enhance their role and relevance; otherwise, they can work in tandem with commercial lawyers and other professionals (such as accountants) interested in public interest work and advocacy.

Ten Excerpts from the Kitāb Ādāb al-kasb wal-maʿāsh

1.On the Virtues of Working¹⁰¹

     As for what is from the Noble Book,¹⁰² it is His statement, And We have made the day for livelihood (Q 78:11), and He        mentioned this in the context of exhibiting His blessings [on humankind]. And He Most High says, And We have established  you on earth and provided you a means of livelihood thereon. Little are you grateful (Q 7:10). Thus He has made livelihood a blessing and demanded gratitude for it. And He Most High says, It is no crime for you to seek bounty from your Lord (Q 2:198). And He Most High says, And others traveling the land seeking the bounty of Allah (Q 73:20). And He Most High says, Then disperse through the land and seek the bounty of Allah (Q 62:10).

    As for what is from the Prophetic reports (al-akhbār),¹⁰³ verily he (the Prophet)—Allah bless and give him peace—has said, “Of the sins, there are sins for which nothing can atone except vexation in seeking a living.”¹⁰⁴ And he—Allah bless and grant him peace—has said, “The honest merchant (al-tājir al-ṣadūq) is resurrected on Judgment Day with the truthful and the martyrs.”¹⁰⁵ And he—Allah bless and give him peace—has said, “asking,¹⁰⁶ to work for [the provisioning of] his dependents and to show compassion to his neighbor, shall meet Allah with his face Whosoever seeks the world lawfully in order to refrain from like the moon on the night when it is full.”¹⁰⁷

    The Prophet—Allah bless and give him peace—was sitting one day with his Companions, and they observed a strong, sturdy youth setting out early to work. They said, “Woe unto this man; would it that his youth and strength were spent in the path of Allah.” The Prophet—may Allah bless and give him peace—said, “Do not say this; for if he works for himself in order to restrain himself from begging and to be independent of people, then he is in the path of Allah. If he works for his impoverished parents or for his impoverished children so as to enrich and suffice them, then he is in the path of Allah. If [however] he works for the sake of showing off and accumulation [of wealth], then he is in the path of Satan.”¹⁰⁸

     And he—Allah bless and give him peace—has said, “Verily, Allah loves the servant who adopts a trade in order to be independent through it of people, and He dislikes a person who learns knowledge in order to adopt it as a trade.”¹⁰⁹ And in a report (al-khabar), “Verily, Allah Most High loves the gainfully employed believer¹¹⁰ (al-muʾmin al-muḥtarif).”¹¹¹ And he—Allah bless and give him peace—has said, “The most licit of what a person eats is from his own work, and [from] every pious¹¹² sale (bayʿ mabrūr).”¹¹³ And in another report, “The most licit of what (the servant eats is [out of] the work of his vocation when he acts in good faith (naṣaḥa).”¹¹⁴ And he—peace be on him—has said, “ tenths of sustenance (al-rizq)¹¹⁵.” It has been narrated that ʿĪsā Hold fast to commerce (al-tijāra) for indeed it constitutes nine (Jesus)—peace be upon him—met a man and he said, “What do you do?” The man said, “I worship.” He said, “Who provides for you?” The man said, “My brother.” He said, “Your brother is more worshipful than you.”¹¹⁶

     As for the traditions (al-āthār):¹¹⁷ Luqmān al-Ḥakīm said to his son, “O my son, seek independence from poverty through lawful earning, for indeed, not a single person becomes impoverished except that he is afflicted by three traits: vulnerability in his religion, weakness in his intelligence, and loss of his dignity. And what is greater than these three is people’s belittling of him.” ʿUmar [ibn al-Khaṭṭāb]—may Allah be pleased with him—said, “None of you should sit unoccupied with seeking sustenance and says, ‘O my Lord, give me sustenance,’ for you are well aware that the sky does not rain down gold or silver.”¹¹⁸ Zayd ibn Maslama¹¹⁹ used to cultivate his land, and ʿUmar—may Allah be pleased with him—said to him, “You are doing the right thing. Be independent of people for that will be more protective of your religion and more munificent of you in respect of them, as your friend Uḥayḥah¹²⁰ has said:

Never have I ceased bestowing lavishly on al-Zawrāʾ¹²¹ For indeed the one of means is munificent to his brethren.

      And Ibn Masʿūd¹²²—Allah be pleased with him—said, “Indeed I detest seeing a person idling, neither occupied with his worldly nor afterworldly concerns.” And Ibrāhīm¹²³ was asked about the truthful merchant (al-tājir al-ṣadūq) as to whether such a person was more to his liking than one exclusively devoted to worship (al-mutafarrigh lil-ʿibāda). He answered, “The truthful merchant is more to my liking for he is in exertion (jihād). Satan comes to [tempt] him through the avenue of measuring and weighing, and through taking and giving, but [despite all that] he strives against him.” However, al-Ḥasan al-Baṣrī¹²⁴ differs with him on that issue.¹²⁵ And ʿUmar [ibn al-Khaṭṭāb]—Allah be pleased with him—said, “There is not a place through which death enters that is more beloved to me than an abode (mawṭin) in which I ply my trade in the market (atasawwuq), buying and selling for the sake of my family.” Al-Haytham¹²⁶ said, “It may be that I come to know of a person speaking bad about me (yaqaʿufiyya), but then I recall my independence of him and thus it becomes light on me.”¹²⁷

      Ayyūb¹²⁸ said, “A work in which there some [small] gain is more to my liking than asking of people.” A violent gale occurred at sea and the people on the ship said to Ibrāhīm ibn Adham¹²⁹ — Allah have mercy on him—who was with them on the ship, “Do you not reckon this to be hardship?” He said, “This is not hardship (al-shidda). Verily hardship is to be in need of people.” Ayyūb¹³⁰ said, “Abū Qilāba¹³¹ said to me, ‘Frequent the market,¹³² for independence is part of wellbeing (al-ghinā min al-ʿāfiya).’”¹³³ This refers to independence from [asking of] people.

2.On Usurious Gain¹³⁴

       Allah Most Glorious has prohibited usurious gain (al-ribā) and shown severity in the matter. It is obligatory on the money- changers (al-ṣayārifa) who deal with the bimetallic money (al-naqdayn)¹³⁵ and on the dealers in foodstuffs to be on guard against it; for there is no usurious gain except in money or in foodstuffs (al-aṭʿima). The money-changer (al-ṣayrafī) should be on guard against usurious gain by deferment (al-nasīʾa) and[/ or] by quantitative disparity (al-faḍl¹³⁶). As for usurious gain by deferment, it is that he should not sell anything of the substance of bimetallic money (al-naqdayn¹³⁷) for anything [else] of the substance of bimetallic money except by way of hand to hand exchange taking place on the spot (majlis)¹³⁸ of the transaction.¹³⁹ This is the way to guard against usurious gain by deferment,¹⁴⁰ [exchange] (yadan bi-yadin), and this is by having the mutual [For example,] the money-changers’ handing over of [raw] gold¹⁴¹ to the mint (dāral-ḍarb) and buying minted dinars [with that gold] is unlawful due to [the incidence of] deferment,¹⁴² and due to the prevalence of the incidence of quantitative disparity (tafāḍul) in respect thereof, since the minted coins do not weigh in equivalent to the weight of the gold [that was handed over in the first place]. As for usurious gain by quantitative disparity (al-faḍl),¹⁴³ one should be on guard against it in three situations.¹⁴⁴ [First,] in selling broken pieces of coins (al-mukassar) for whole pieces (al-ṣaḥīḥ). It is not permissible to conduct transactions (al-muʿāmala) in these coins except in exact [quantitative] equivalence (al-mumāthala). [Second,] in selling the good quality coins (al-jayyid) for bad coins (al-radiyy). One should not buy coins of poor quality with good quality coins of less weight, or sell the bad quality coins for good quality ones of more weight—I mean when one sells gold for gold, or silver for silver; but when the sale pertains to two different types¹⁴⁵ of coins, then there is no harm in quantitative disparity (al-faḍl).

      And third, in [selling] things compounded (al-murakkabāt) of gold and silver, such as dinars composited of gold and silver. If the amount of gold [in those composite coins] is unknown, it is invalid to transact with them at all, unless such money circulates as currency in the land (jāriyan fī-l-balad), in which case we give dispensation (nurakhkhis) in transacting with it as long as it is not considered equivalent for [pure gold] coins (al-naqd).¹⁴⁶ Likewise dirhams that have been adulterated with copper (al-nuḥās); if these are not in circulation as currency (rāʾiḥa) in the land, then it is not valid to transact with them, because what is sought in them is the silver content (al-nuqra) but that is unknown. If these dirhams are currency (naqdan rāʾiḥan) in the land, then we give dispensation in transacting [with them] because of the need (al-ḥāja) [for them], and because the silver content is not meant to be extracted [from these coins]; but these [adulterated coins] are not at all to be considered equivalent (yuqābil) to [pure] silver (al-nuqra). Likewise, [with regard to] every piece of jewellery compounded (ḥaliyy murakkab) of gold and silver, it is not permissible to buy it, neither with gold nor silver. Rather it should be bought with another commodity (matāʿ)¹⁴⁷ if the amount of gold in it is known, unless if it is coated with a coating of gold such that the gold sought cannot be extracted upon assaying with fire (al-ʿarḍ ʿalā al-nār), in which case it is permissible to sell it with its equivalent in silver (al-nuqra), or with what is preferred other than silver. And likewise, it is not permissible for the money-changer to buy a necklace of pearl and gold¹⁴⁸ for gold, or to sell it, but rather for silver in a hand to hand sale if there is no silver content in the necklace. It is not permissible (lā yajūz) to buy garments woven of gold—from which the gold sought¹⁴⁹ (dhahab maqṣūd) can be extracted upon assaying by fire—with gold; but it is permissible with silver and with other than silver [from among the commodities].

      And as for the dealers (al-mutaʿāmilūn) in foodstuffs, it is [obligatory] on them to execute reciprocal taking-possession (al- taqābuḍ) during the sale meeting (al-majlis), whether or not there is a difference between the types of food to be sold and bought. If the food exchanged is of the same type, then they are obliged to execute reciprocal taking-possession as well as to observe mutual equivalence (al-mumāthala). What usually happens in this regard is [as in the case of] the transaction of the butcher, such as when a goat would be handed over to him and meat is then purchased with it in cash¹⁵⁰ (naqdan) or on credit (nasīʾatan); such a transaction is unlawful. [And likewise,] the transaction of the oil presser¹⁵¹ (al-ʿaṣṣār), such that seeds or sesame or olives are handed over to him in order that the oil [pressed from the seeds] be taken from him [in return]; such transaction is [also] unlawful. Likewise [the case of] milk, such that milk is given in order to take from him¹⁵² [in return] cheese, cream, butter or other parts of the milk; this is also unlawful.

      Foodstuff (al-ṭaʿām) is not to be sold with other kinds of foodstuff except in cash,¹⁵³ and nor sold with its kind except in cash (naqdan) and with [quantitative] parity (mumāthilan). And [as for] everything that is produced from something edible (al-shayʾ al-maṭʿūm), it is not permissible to sell the product for it,¹⁵⁴ whether with [quantitative] parity (mumāthilan) or disparity mutafāḍilan). Hence, flour, bread, and mush (sawīq) are not sold for wheat; nor syrup (dibs), vinegar (al-khall), or juice for grapes or dates; nor cream, butter, buttermilk (makhīḍ), whey (maṣl), or cheese for milk. Quantitative parity (mumāthilan) is of no avail if the foodstuff is not in a condition of complete preservation (kamāl al-iddikhār). Hence, fresh dates (ruṭab) are not to be sold for fresh dates, nor grapes for grapes, whether with [quantitative] disparity or parity.¹⁵⁵ These [elucidations] are adequate for explaining the sale (taʿrīf al-bayʿ), and for bringing attention to what will lead the merchant to be aware of the sources of corruption so that he may seek legal opinion whenever he is uncertain and confused about anything in respect thereof. But if he is not cognizant of this [science], then he will not be perceptive of the occasions for enquiring, and he will thereby plunge into usurious gain and into the unlawful without being conscious of it.

3.On Hoarding¹⁵⁶

      The first type is hoarding (al-iḥtikār).¹⁵⁷ [In this case,] the seller of staple foodstuffs (al-ṭaʿām) stores up staple foodstuffs in anticipation for their prices to appreciate. This is an act of general oppression (ẓulm ʿām), and its perpetrator is censured (madhmūm) in Revealed Law. The Messenger of Allah—Allah bless and gives him peace—has said, “Whosoever hoards food for forty days and then gives it away in charity, his charity will not be an expiation for his [sin of] hoarding.”¹⁵⁸ And [ʿAbdullāh] ibn ʿUmar narrated from him—Allah bless and grant him peace—that he said, “Whosoever hoards food for forty days has indeed disavowed Allah, and Allah has disavowed him,”¹⁵⁹ and it is said [in another version], “It is as if he has killed all of humankind.”¹⁶⁰ And [it is related] from ʿAlī—may Allah be pleased with him—“Whosoever hoards food for forty days, his heart has hardened.”¹⁶¹ It is also [related] from him that he burned the food of a hoarder in the fire.¹⁶² It has been narrated concerning the virtue of abandoning hoarding from him—Allah bless and grant him peace—“Whosoever imports (jalaba) food and then sells it at the day’s price, it is as if he has given it away in charity (taṣaddaqa),”¹⁶³ and in another wording, “...it is as if he has emancipated a slave (raqaba).”¹⁶⁴ It is said in regard to the statement of Allah Most High, And those who seek to misuse it to do oppression in it, We will have them taste of a painful penalty (Q 22:25), that hoarding is part of oppression and included in the meaning of this threat (al-waʿīd).

     It is reported of a pious predecessor (al-salaf) that he was in Wāsiṭ¹⁶⁵ where he loaded a boatful of wheat (ḥinṭa) for Baṣra, and wrote to his agent (wakīl) [there],¹⁶⁶ “Sell this food on the day you arrive in Baṣra, and do not postpone until the next day.” The agent encountered [in Baṣra] low [wheat] prices, and the merchants [there] said to him, “If you postpone [selling] it until Friday, you will profit many times over.” So he postponed it until Friday and profited in its sale many times over. He then wrote to the wheat owner informing him of that, and he wrote back to him, “Oh, [how unfortunate is] this! We would have been content with a little profit along with the security of our religion, while you have contravened [this arrangement]. We do not desire to multiply profits by its sale through sacrificing anything of the religion. You have surely committed a crime against us. When this letter of mine reaches you, take all the money (al-māl)¹⁶⁷ and give it away in charity to the poor of Baṣra. Would that I were delivered from the crime of hoarding altogether, regardless of whether it was [committed] against me or for me.” And know that the prohibition of hoarding is absolute (al-nahy muṭlaq),¹⁶⁸ but some considerations pertain to it in regard to the occasion (al-waqt) [of hoarding] and the kind (al-jins) [of food hoarded]. As for the kind [of food], the prohibition of hoarding applies to the various kinds of staple foodstuffs (al-aqwāt).¹⁶⁹ But, as for what is not a staple food (qūt) nor [substantively] complementary to staple food (muʿīn ʿalā al-qūt)—like medicinal remedies (al-adwiya), spices (al-ʿaqāqīr), saffron (al-zaʿfarān), and others like these—then the prohibition does not apply to them, even if they are eaten [together with food]. And as for what complements staple foods, like meat and fruits, and what substitutes the need for staple foods on some occasions—even though it is not possible for it to be eaten on a regular basis, then this issue is subject to scrutiny [with regard to the prohibition of hoarding them or not]. There are those from among the scholars (ʿulamāʾ) who extend the prohibition [of hoarding] to cooking butter¹⁷⁰ (al-samn), honey (al-ʿasl), sesame oil (al-shīraj), cheese (al-jubn), olive oil (al-zayt), and other foods like these.

     As for the occasion (al-waqt), the prohibition of hoarding also bears application to all occasions (jāmiʿ al-awqāt), and this is evidenced by the story we have mentioned regarding the food that encountered low prices in Baṣra. [However,] it can also bear application specifically to occasions when food is in short supply while people are in need of it, such that postponing its sale would bring about some hardship. But as for when food is widely available and abundant, while people are not in need of it and they do not incline to it except [when the food is offered] at low prices, and [in this situation] the food dealer awaits that [171] but awaits not scarcity,¹⁷² then there is no harm in withholding the sale of the food. But if the time [in question] is the time of drought (zamān al-qaḥṭ),¹⁷³ then there will be harm in storing up honey, ghee, sesame oil, and other foods like these; and so it¹⁷⁴ should be judged to be prohibited [as hoarding]. Negating or affirming the prohibition will depend on [the existence or non- existence of] harm (al-ḍarar), for that is categorically understood (mafhūm qaṭʿan) from particularizing food [as the object of the prohibition of hoarding in the prophetic reports cited]. [And even] if there is no harm, hoarding up foodstuffs [still] cannot be shielded from [the judgment of] offensiveness (karāhiyya), for it is anticipating the foundations for harm (mabādiʾ al-ḍarar),¹⁷⁵ which is the inflation of prices; and anticipating the foundations for harm is forbidden (maḥẓūr), just like anticipating the actual harm itself (ʿayn al-ḍarar), but the former is lesser [in gravity] than the latter. And anticipating the actual harm itself is [in turn] lesser [in gravity] than the [actual] damages (al-aḍrār) [resulting therefrom]. Hence the degrees of offensiveness (al-karāhiyya) and prohibition (al-taḥrīm) fluctuate in tandem with the degrees of damages.

4.On Counterfeit Money¹⁷⁶

     The second type is putting counterfeit dirhams into circulation (tarwij al-zayf min al-darāhim) together with the [bona fide] money (al-naqd¹⁷⁷), since the transactor will be harmed by them if he is unaware; and [even] if he is aware he will [in turn] circulate them to others, and likewise the third and fourth transactors [in their turn]. This counterfeit money will not cease to be passed around in the hands [of people], and thus the harm becomes pervasive (yaʿumm al-ḍarar) and the corruption widespread (yattasiʿu al-fasād). The crime of all of them and its evil consequences will recoil on him,¹⁷⁸ for he is the one who opened this door [to harm and corruption in the first place]. The Messenger of Allah—Allah bless and give him peace—has said, “Whosoever initiates an evil convention (sunna sayyiʾa), and those after him practice it, he will bear its crime and the like of the crime of those who practice it, without any diminishment in [bearing the full burden of] their crimes.”¹⁷⁹

     One of them (the Predecessors) said, “The spending of one counterfeit dirham (dirham zayf) is more serious than stealing one hundred dirhams.”¹⁸⁰ This is because stealing is [only] a single iniquity, which is completed and terminated [when the act is done], while the spending of counterfeit dirhams is an [evil] innovation that he has manifested in the religion, and an evil custom (sunna sayyiʾa) that will be perpetuated by those after him. Therefore the crime of that evil custom will be borne by him after his death for a hundred years or for two hundred years [or more] until those coins are destroyed.¹⁸¹ He will also be held accountable for whatever that is corrupted and diminished of people’s wealth due to his [evil] precedent. Fortunate indeed is he who passes away and his sins pass away with him; whereas prolonged perdition unto him who passes away while his sins abide for a hundred or two hundred years or more, suffering punishment in his grave because of them, and being held to account for them until the end of their extinction. Allah Most High says, And We record what they have sent ahead and what they have left after them (Q 36:12), meaning that, “We also record what they have deferred of the traces of their deeds,¹⁸² just as We record what they have forwarded.” This is comparable to the statement of Allah Most High, Man will be told on that day what he forwarded and what he deferred (Q 75:13). He indeed defers the consequences of his deeds from out of the evil custom¹⁸³ practiced by other people. One should know that in regard to counterfeit money there are five issues. The first issue is that if anything is returned to him of counterfeit money, he should throw it into a well such that no hands can be extended to reach it, and he should take care not to circulate it through another transaction. And if he destroys it such that it can no longer be possible to transact with it, then it is permissible.

     The second issue is that it is obligatory on the merchant to learn about money (taʿallum al-naqd), not for his self-interest per se, but [also] so that he can avoid giving a [single] counterfeit coin to a Muslim out of heedlessness, lest he should be sinful due to his shortcoming in learning this science of money. Since for every vocation there is a science by means of which Muslims are well counseled, then acquiring it is obligatory. It is because of issues like this that the Pious Predecessors (al-salaf) acquired the science of knowing the characteristics of money out of concern for their religion, rather than their [commercial profit in the life of this] world. The third issue is that if the trader hands over the dirham to his transactor, who recognizes it to be counterfeit, the trader will [still] not escape sinning because [he knows] that the transactor does not take it except to circulate it to another person without telling him; and if the transactor [really] does not intend to do that he will [surely] not desire to take it [from him] in the first place, and so the trader escapes the sin of harming on the part of the transactor only.¹⁸⁴ The fourth issue is that he accepts counterfeit money (al-zayf) so as to apply the statement of the Prophet, Allah bless and give him peace, “May Allah be merciful to a person who is indulgent in selling, indulgent in buying, indulgent in paying (al-qaḍāʾ), and indulgent in claiming (al-iqtiḍāʾ),”¹⁸⁵ then he is included in the blessing of this invocation (al-duʿāʾ) if he resolves to toss it into a well. But if he resolves to circulate it in a transaction, then this is an evil which Satan promotes to him by making it appear to be good, and hence he will not be included among those who are “indulgent in taking payment.” The fifth issue is that by “counterfeit money” (al-zayf) we mean what has no silver content (nuqra) in it at all but, instead, has been coated with a base metal (mumawwa),¹⁸⁶ or what has no gold in it—I mean in the case of dinars. But as for what contains silver [in the case of dirhams]—and if it is mixed with copper and is the money of the land—then the scholars differed in regard to transacting with it. My strong view is to allow dispensation (al-rukhsa) for its use if it is the money of the land (naqd al-balad), regardless of whether the amount of silver [in it] is known or not. But if it is not the money of the land, then it is not permissible [to transact with it], unless the amount of silver [in it] is known. If there is in his property a coin¹⁸⁷ whose silver content is less than [that contained] in the money of the land, then he is obliged to inform his transactor about it and to avoid transacting in it except with those who do not condone its circulation into the money supply by way of deception (al-talbīs). But as for those who condone that, then handing it over to them is enabling them to sow [monetary] corruption, and such action is like selling grapes on the part of a person who knows that the buyer will make it into wine. That is forbidden, for it is giving assistance to do evil and participating in it. Treading the path of the truth on this [ethical] pattern in commerce is more difficult than assiduousness in [the observance of] the supererogatory devotions (nawāfil al-ʿibādat) and secluding oneself for them. Because of this, one of them (the Predecessors)¹⁸⁸ said, “The truthful merchant is more virtuous with Allah than the devotee.”

     The Pious Predecessors were so careful about something like this that it is related from one of the warriors (al-ghuzā) in the path of Allah that he said, “I mounted my horse to kill a rascal [from among the unbelievers], but it became recalcitrant with me and I had to turn back while that rascal slipped away from me. Then I mounted my horse a second time but it was still obstinate with me and I had to turn back. Then I mounted it a third time but it fled away from under me. I was not used to experience such an attitude from it, and so I returned [to the army camp] in a despondent state. I sat down, my head slumping, broken-hearted over my failure to get at that rascal and the [bad] behavior of my horse. I put my head down on a tent beam [and slept] while my horse [was secured] standing [by my side]. Then I saw my horse in my sleep as if it were addressing me, and it was saying, ‘Have fear of Allah! You wished to capture that rascal three times, but yesterday you bought for me some fodder and you paid its price with a counterfeit dirham. That will never ever do at all!’” He said, “Then I woke up suddenly, and I went right away to the seller of provender (al-allāf) and replaced that counterfeit dirham for him [with a good one].”¹⁸⁹ This [story] is an example of what causes pervasive harm, and one should infer from it to other similar situations.

5.On Justice and Avoiding Harm¹⁹⁰

    Anything by which the transactor is harmed is oppression. Justice (al-ʿadl) is that a Muslim is not harmed by his brother. The general precept (al-ḍābiṭ al-kullī) here is that “one desires not for his brother except what he desires for himself” (an lā yuḥibb li akhīh illā mā yuḥibb li nafsih). One should not engage other people in any transaction that would have caused hardship to him or burden his heart were he himself to be engaged in it. Rather, one should view as equally valuable one’s own dirham and the dirham of one’s brother. Some of them said, “Whosoever sells something to his brother for a dirham which he himself would not have deemed proper to buy unless it were for five dawāniq,¹⁹¹ then he has indeed abandoned giving the good counsel (al-nuṣḥ) that is enjoined in transaction, in which case he desires not for his brother what he desires for himself.” This is the gist of this division. As for its elucidation, it is with regard to four issues, which are: that one should not extol the merchandise (al-silʿa) for what is not in it; that one should not conceal any of its defects (ʿuyūb) or hidden features at all; that one should not conceal anything of its [true] weight (wazn) or measure (miqdār); and that one should not conceal anything of its price, such that if the buyer were to know about it he would not have wanted it.

6.On Acting in Good Faith and Giving Good Counsel¹⁹²

     The obligation of acting in good faith (al-nuṣḥ) by revealing defects is proven by what is narrated regarding when the Prophet—Allah bless and give him peace—took the pledge of allegiance (bāyaʿa) to Islam from Jarīr and when he then proceeded to depart, the Prophet—Allah bless and give him peace—suddenly caught hold of his shirt and charged him to act in good faith to every Muslim. Thereafter, whenever Jarīr went about to sell his merchandise, he would point out its defects [to the buyer] and then allow [him] the option [of cancelling the purchase], and he would say, “If you wish you may take it, and if you wish you may leave it.” It was said to him, “Indeed, if you do like this your sale will not be transacted for you.” Whereupon he said, “We have pledged ourselves to the Messenger of Allah—Allah bless and grant him peace—to act in good faith with every Muslim.”¹⁹³ [It was related that] Wāthila ibn al-Asqaʿ¹⁹⁴ was standing [by] when a man sold a camel of his [to another man] for three hundred dirhams. Wāthila thought nothing of it until that man had left with the camel, and then [something occurred to him and] he rushed after him and began to speak earnestly to him, “O this [camel]! Did you buy it for meat or for riding?” He said, “Indeed, for riding.” Then he said, “I have noticed a perforation in its hoof, and it will surely not be able to continue on its way.” The man turned back to return the camel [to the seller], whereupon the seller discounted one hundred dirhams from its [original sale] price, and he then said to Wāthila, “May Allah have mercy on you. You have spoiled my sale to my detriment.” Wāthila said, “We have pledged ourselves to the Messenger of Allah—Allah bless and grant him peace—to act in good faith with every Muslim.” And he (Wāthila) said, “I have indeed heard the Messenger of Allah—Allah bless and give him peace—say: ‘It is not licit for a seller to sell something unless he makes known its shortcomings, and it is not licit for someone who knows that except that he tells about it.’”¹⁹⁵ Therefore they had understood from giving good counsel (al-nuṣḥ) that one does not desire for his brother except what he desires for himself. They did not consider giving good counsel to be something [merely] complementing the moral excellences (al-faḍāʾil) and augmenting the spiritual stations (ziyādāt al-maqāmāt), but rather they believed it to be the [very foundational] requirements of Islam that were included in their pledge of allegiance. This matter is something arduous for most people, and because of that they opted for seclusion to devote themselves to worship and for withdrawal from people, since discharging the rights of Allah along with socializing and transacting [with people] are a striving [against the self] that cannot be carried out except by the truthful (al-ṣiddīqūn).

7.On Magnanimity in Pricing¹⁹⁶ 

       The seller [or buyer] should not exact an opportunistic price from his counterpart (sāḥibuh) that he would not normally exact (for the type of merchandise concerned]. Opportunistic-pricing (al-mughābana)¹⁹⁷ is allowed (maʾdhūn) in principle because selling is for making profit (al-ribḥ); and this is not possible except through some degree of opportunistic-pricing, but one is to consider approximation (al-taqrīb) [to the cost price].¹⁹⁸ If the buyer pays [a price] higher than what is normally profitable [for the seller]—whether due to his great desire or great need for the item in his current situation—then the seller should decline to accept it,¹⁹⁹ and that will constitute magnanimity [on his part]. However, so long as there is no deception (talbīs) involved, then it is not oppression to take the increased payment. Some scholars are of the view that opportunistic-pricing (al-ghabn) by increasing the price to more than one third of the [cost or market price²⁰⁰] will necessitate the option (al-khiyār) [to rescind the sale],²⁰¹ but we do not hold the same view. However, it is part of being magnanimous to reduce that opportunistic-price [to a reasonable amount]. It has been related that Yūnus ibn ʿUbayd had some suits of clothes (ḥulal) of different prices, and for each suit (ḥalla) he had set its price—one variety each suit of which was valued at four hundred, and [another] variety each suit of which was valued at two hundred [dinars or dirhams].²⁰² He went away to pray and left behind his nephew in the shop (al-dukkān). A countryman (aʿrābī) then came [to the shop] and requested a suit of clothes for four hundred. The nephew displayed to him a suit of the variety priced at two hundred. He deemed it good, liked it, and bought it. He left with it, and he held it in his hands. Yūnus met him [in the streets] and recognised his suit of clothes. He said to the countryman, “How much did you pay for it?” He said, “Four hundred.” He said, “It is not worth more than two hundred. Go back so that you may return it.” The countryman said, “This is worth five hundred in my region, and [moreover] I am pleased with it.” Whereupon Yūnus said to him, “Go back, for indeed giving good counsel (al-nuṣḥ) in the religion is better than the world and all that it contains.” He returned the suit to the shop and Yūnus gave him back the two hundred. He then reprimanded his nephew for that incident, contended with him, and said, “Are you not ashamed? Do you not fear Allah? How could you profit by the value of the price and abandon giving good counsel to Muslims?” His nephew said, “By Allah! He did not take it except after being pleased with it.” He said, “Well then, why didn’t you desire for him what you would have desired for yourself?” In this incident [of opportunistic-pricing], if there had been in it any concealment of the [actual] price or any deception, then it would have been in the category of oppression, and this has been mentioned before.²⁰³ And in a hadith [it is stated], Overcharging the innocent²⁰⁴ is unlawful (ghabn al-mustarsil “ḥarām).”²⁰⁵

      Al-Zubayr ibn ʿAdī²⁰⁶ used to say, “I came to know eighteen persons from among the Companions, and none of them deemed it nice to buy meat for [less than] one dirham.” Overcharging innocent²⁰⁷ people like them is oppression.²⁰⁸ But if the overcharging does not involve deception then it is abandoning magnanimity [albet not oppressive]. However, rarely is opportunistic-pricing accomplished except through some form of deception and concealing the current price²⁰⁹ (siʿr al-waqt). [As for] genuine magnanimity (al-iḥsān al-maḥḍ), it is what has been narrated regarding al-Sariyy al-Saqaṭī,²¹⁰ that he bought a load (kurr²¹¹) of almonds (lawz) for sixty dinars and wrote in his ledger (rūznāmaj)²¹² three dinars as his profit margin. It was as if he had reckoned to profit by half a dinar for every ten dinars. Then the almonds rose to ninety dinars in price. A broker (al-dallāl) came to him and requested for the almonds. He said, “ Takeit. ” He said, For how much?” He said, “For sixty-three.” The broker, who was “also an upright person, said, “The price of almonds have now reached ninety dinars!” Al-Sariyy said, “I have made a resolution that I will not undo. I shall not sell it except for sixty-three dinars [only].” The broker said, “I have made a pact between myself and Allah that I will not defraud a Muslim. I shall not take it from you except for ninety dinars.” The narrator said, “[In the end,] the broker did not buy from him, and al-Sariyy did not sell to him.” This is genuine magnanimity from both parties, due to their knowledge about the reality of the situation.²¹³

8.Commerce and Personal Integrity²¹⁴

        Commerce is the touchstone²¹⁵ of true men (miḥakk al-rijāl), by which a person’s religion is put to the test, along with his scrupulousness (warʿ); hence it was said: 

Do not be lured by the person’s tattered tunic²¹⁶ 

or by his waist-cloth raised above the ankles,²¹⁷ 

or his brow on which a dark mark is impressed²¹⁸

but by the dirham assess his passion or caution.²¹⁹ 

Because of this it has been said, “If a man is praised by his neighbors in the town, by his companions in a journey, and by his transactors in the marketplaces, then do not entertain misgivings about his integrity.” A witness (shāhid) was giving testimony in the presence of ʿUmar ibn al-Khaṭṭāb—Allah be pleased with him—and ʿUmar said, “Bring me someone who knows you.” He brought a person who extolled his goodness. ʿUmar said, “Are you his close neighbor who knows his comings and goings?” He said, “No.” ʿUmar said, “Have you been his companion on  a journey in the course of which you discerned his good character traits?” He said, “No.” ʿUmar said,  Have you ever conducted transactions with him “in dinars and dirhams by which you discerned his conscientiousness?” He said, “No.” ʿUmar said,  “I suspect you [only] saw him standing in the mosque, engrossing people’s attention with [his reading of] the Qurʾān, while bowing and raising his head now and then?” He said, “Yes.” ʿUmar then said, “Go, for you do not know him.” Then he said to the witness, “Go and bring me someone who [really] knows you.”

9. On Intention and the Imperative of the Commonweal²²⁰

       It does not behoove the merchant to be occupied with his livelihood (maʿāsh) at the expense of his life to come (maʿād), lest he should squander his life away and suffer a bad bargain (ṣafqa khāsira). What he loses of profits in the Afterlife cannot be compensated by what he gains from this world, and he will be among those who buy the worldly life (al-ḥayāt al-dunyā) with the Afterlife (al-ākhira). Rather, it behooves the intelligent to show concern (al-shafqa) for his soul (nafs), and his showing concern for his soul is by preserving his capital, and his capital is his religion and his commerce in it. Some of the Predecessors have said, “The things most appropriate for the intelligent person are those most required for him over the short term, and the things most required for him over the short term are those most praiseworthy with respect to their consequences over the long term.” Muʿādh ibn Jabal—Allah be pleased with him—says in his will (waṣiyya), “It is essential for you to have your portion (naṣīb) of this world, though you are more in need of your portion of the Afterlife. Hence, begin with your portion of the Afterlife and take it, for indeed you shall pass by your portion of this world and you shall orchestrate it.” Allah Most High says, “And do not forget your portion of the world,” that is, do not forget while you are in this world [to prepare] your portion of it for the [sake of your salvation in the] Afterlife,²²¹ for the world is the seed-bed of the Hereafter, and in it you earn your good deeds (al-ḥasanāt). The merchant’s concern for his religion is only fully realized by taking care of seven matters.

         The first matter²²² is a wholesome intention (al-niyya) and conviction (al-ʿaqīda) at the beginning of a commercial undertaking. So he is to intend to abstain from beggary (al-suʾāl), to restrain himself from coveting what is in the hands of people by being independent of them through one’s licit earning, to assist in one’s observance of religion through what he earns, and to provide adequately for one’s dependents, and thereby becoming among those who strive in the path of Allah through his commerce. One should also intend to give good counsel to the Muslims, to desire for the rest of creation what one desires for oneself, to intend to follow the path of justice and magnanimity as we have elaborated,²²³ and to intend to command what is right and forbid what is wrong in whatever that he sees in the market. If one internalizes into one’s heart these convictions and intentions, then one is working on the path to the Hereafter, and if in the process one should acquire some wealth, then that is a boon (mazīd); and even if one should suffer some loss in this world, he would nevertheless gain profit in the Afterlife. The second matter is to intend, through one’scraft, commerce, or work, the discharge of one of the obligations of sufficiencies (furūḍ al-kifāyāt).²²⁴ Were the crafts and the businesses to be abandoned, the livelihoods of people would be disrupted, and most people would perish [as a consequence]. Therefore the well-ordering of the affairs of all is realized through the cooperation of all (intiẓām amr al-kull bi-taʿāwun al-kull), while each group assumes an occupation. If all of them were to be devoted to a single vocation (ṣināʿa), then the rest of the vocations would be left unattended and people would be destroyed. It is in the light of this reality that some of the scholars have interpreted the saying of the Prophet—Allah bless and give him peace—“The diversity of my Community is a mercy (ikhtilāf ummatī raḥmatun),”²²⁵ as referring to the diversity of their occupations in the various crafts and vocations. And of the crafts,²²⁶ there are those which are important, and there are those which can be done without²²⁷ because these have to do with the seeking of comforts (al niʿam) and embellishment (al-tazayyun) in this world. Hence, one should be occupied with an important vocation so that by practicing it he takes care of something of concern in the religion for the Muslims. He should avoid crafts having to do with engraving (al-naqsh), goldsmithery (al-ṣiyāgha), plastering²²⁸ buildings with gypsum (al-jiṣṣ), and everything by which the world is embellished. All that is despised by people of religion. 

10. On Accountability to Oneself, to Others, and to Allah²²⁹

      One should keep a keen eye on all avenues of one’s transaction with every single one of those with whom he transacts, for he is being watched (murāqab) and taken to account (muḥāsab), so that he should prepare his response on the Day of Accounting and Penalty (yawm al-ḥisāb wal-ʿiqāb) in respect of his every deed and word, as to why he embarked boldly on them, and for what reason. Indeed, it has been said that the merchant shall be made to stand firmly on the Day of Resurrection with every person to whom he had sold something, and he shall be held to account fully for [his dealing with] every single one of them to the number of those whom he had transacted with [in the life of this world]. One of them said, “I saw one of the merchants in my sleep, and so I said to him, ‘What has Allah done with you?’ He said, ‘Fifty thousand scrolls [of accounts] were unrolled for me.’ I said, ‘Were these all sins?’ He said, ‘These were transactions with people, to the number of every person with whom I had transacted in the world. Each person had his own individual scroll regarding everything between me and him, from the very beginning of his transaction [with me] until its very end.’” Therefore this is what is incumbent on the earner [to be cognizant of] in his work²³⁰ in respect of what pertains to justice, magnanimity, and showing concern for the religion. If he limits himself to [observing] justice, then he is from among the upright (al-ṣāliḥūn). And if he appends magnanimity to that, then he is among those who are brought near (al-muqarrabūn) [to Allah]. And if, in addition to that, he seriously takes into account [and attends to] the service of the religious life, as we have mentioned in the Fifth Chapter,²³¹ then he shall be among the truthful (al-ṣiddīqūn). And Allah is Most Knowing of what is sound.

Conclusion

     Over the course of the past few years, I have come to notice in my many discussions and interactions with fiqh scholars, business professionals, ordinary merchants, and traders, as well as with students and all those concerned about economic, financial, and commercial matters, that the standard fiqh manuals (like Shaykh Nuh Keller’s Reliance of the Traveller) are not really adequate for reviving classical muʿāmala in the current age if the reader, student, or even scholar fails to attain or be truly cognizant of the underlying meta-economic or meta-legal vision in which the formal fiqh of muʿāmala finds its substantive meaning, direction, and purpose. Reading the classical kasb texts have led me to call this meta-legal (or meta-fiqh) vision the Islamic Gift Economy (al-iqtiṣād al-iḥsānī²³²) or Common-Good Economics (al-iqtiṣād al-maṣlaḥī) as a dialectical framework to allow those texts to engage creatively and evaluatively with current economic concerns. In the light of this vision, I suggest we re-define the science of economics as “the science of earning and provisioning of livelihoods (al-maʿāyish) for the common good” (ʿilm al-iktisāb wal-infāq), and thereby do away for good with the current secular, materialistic, and nihilistic obsession with, and addiction to, dogmatic, cognitively-vacuous notions of scarcity and wants that have been so hegemonic over the way most experts, policy makers and, indeed, Muslim economists think about economics and the economy. 

     If economics is, following its original etymological meaning, the science of “household management,” or rather, the science of household stewardship, and the end of this stewardship is the well-being of the household, then any system of economics that leads, wittingly or unwittingly, to the dissolution of the household, or to the desolation of the earth as the macro-household, can only be an elaborate nihilistic inversion of the true meaning and purpose of economics.²³³ In the wake of the current financial and economic meltdown and widespread rethinking of all key economic concepts, Muslims should call for a serious and honest return to and creative revival of the traditional approach to understanding economics and the economy, which takes care to seamlessly embed the short-term goal of worldly prosperity into the larger, long-term goal of intergenerational sustainability and, ultimately, eternal felicity in the Afterlife. This understanding is very much in line with the Worldview of Islām (ruʾyat al-Islām lil-wujūd), which, as Syed Muhammad Naquib al-Attas puts it, encompasses both al-dunyā and al-ākhirah, in which the dunyā-aspect must be related in a profound and inseparable way to the ākhirah-aspect, and in which “ the ākhirah-aspect has ultimate and final significance.”²³⁴ This re-expresses the understanding of the “Proof of Islam and the Muslims” (i.e., al-Ghazālī) when he says these words:

Verily the Lord of lords and the Causer of causes has made the Afterlife the abode of reimbursement (al-thawāb) and chastisement (al-ʿiqāb), and the world (al-dunyā) the abode of intrigue, tumult, and endeavor. The endeavor in the world is not restricted to the Return to the Afterlife (al-maʿād)²³⁵ at the expense of livelihood (al-maʿāsh).²³⁶ But rather, the livelihood [ an aid towards it, for the world is the seedbed of the Hereafter (in this world] is an expedient to the Return to the Afterlife, and (al-dunyā mazraʿat al-ākhira) and a route towards it.²³⁷

    The overriding meta-economic vision here is always that the personal acquisition of material wealth is to find its direction, purpose, and meaning in the service of individual spiritual advancement and communal belonging; that the personal pursuit of livelihood is to serve both communal and personal wellbeing; and that wellbeing pertains to both the life of this world and the life of the Afterlife. This is a vision, that, in the modern context, would resonate rather well, at least in regard to ethico-moral substance, with the “sacred economics” of Charles Eisenstein²³⁸ and Eileen Workman,²³⁹ and with the “Buddhist economics” of E.F. Schumacher’s incredibly insightful Small is Beautiful²⁴⁰ or even the “common-good” economics of Herman Daly.

     If one is concerned about putting back soul, substance, and thereby meaning into the formal mechanisms of economic exchange and directing this exchange toward serving its proper end, which is (as defined above) the “earning and provisioning of livelihood for the common good,” and—for Muslims especially—reviving and re-realizing true muʿāmala (literally, “working together”), then they will certainly find the works of al-Shaybānī, al-Khallāl, al-Ghazālī, al-Dimashqī, al-Lubūdī, and our other great, erudite classical scholars, to be a most authentic, well-considered, and common sensical guide toward attaining to that important objective, and, moreover, one that is of impeccable authority and deeply rooted in our religious identity and historical experience. By mastering, learning, teaching, and implementing at both a personal and structural level the ethico-juristic vision of the classical kasb literature, all concerned, thinking Muslims (and even non-Muslims) will find themselves to be in a better position to attain to both the conceptual and the operational tools now so urgently needed for a close, critical, and constructive engagement with all aspects of today’s dynamic and promising counter-economics discourse. A true science of economics must be about the proper means of fair and equitable provisioning of livelihoods for everyone, especially the poor, the weak and the marginalized, and the ethical, legal, and political framework in which that fair and equitable provisioning for the preservation of the commonweal can be promoted and nurtured. We believe that a creative and informed reading and discussion of this little treatise of al-Ghazālī, “the Proof of Islam and Muslims,” will be of great assistance to us in our current efforts to revive that true science of economics in our vision and in our action, in shāʾAllāh.

O believers, give of the good things you have earned (Q 2:267)

 

 

 

ʿAdī Setia is Associate Professor at the Center for Advanced Studies on Islam, Science & Civilization (CASIS), Malaysia Technology University, http://www.utm.my/casis/; and General Coordinator for the communi-ty-rooted initiative, Worldview of Islam Research Academy (WIRA).

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1. In Iḥyāʾ ʿulūm al-dīn, 10 vols. (Jeddah: Dār al-Minhāj, 2011), 3:235–339. All relevant citations to this edition.

2. Muḥammad ibn al-Ḥasan al-Shaybānī, Kitāb al-Kasb, ed. ʿAbd al-Fattāḥ Abū Ghudda (Aleppo: Maktab al-Maṭbūʿat al-Islāmiyya, 1417H), trans. Adi Setia as The Book of Earning a Livelihood (Kuala Lumpur: IBFIM, 2012); see also Adi Setia, “Imām Muḥammad Ibn al-Ḥasan al-Shaybānī on Earning a Livelihood: Seven Excerpts from his Kitāb al-Kasb,” Islam & Science 10, no. 2 (Winter 2012):99-116.

3. A new study of him is Gavin N. Picken, Spiritual Purification in Islam: The Life and Works of al-Muḥāsibī (New York: Routledge, 2011).

4. ʿAbdullāh al-Ḥārith ibn Asad al-Muḥāsibī, al-Makāsib wal-waraʿ wal-shubha wa bayān mubāḥihā wa maḥẓūrihā wa ikhtilāf al-nās fī ṭalabihā wal-radd ʿalā al-ghāliṭinā fī-hā, ed. ʿAbd al-Qādir Aḥmad ʿAṭā (Beirut: Muʾassasat al-Kutub al-Thaqāfiyya, 1987); also published under the title al-Makāsib wal-rizq al-ḥalāl wa ḥaqīqat al-tawakkul ʿalā Allāh, ed. Muḥammad ʿUthmān al-Khist (Cairo: Maktabat al-Qurʾān, 1983).

5. Abū Bakr Aḥmad ibn Muḥammad al-Khallāl, al-Ḥathth ʿalā al-tijāra wal- ṣināʿa wal-ʿamal, ed. ʿAbd al-Fattāḥ Abū Ghudda (Aleppo: Maktab al-Maṭbūʿat al-Islāmiyya, 1995); ed. Abū ʿAbd Allāh Maḥmūd ibn Muḥammad al-Ḥaddād (Riyāḍ: Dār al-ʿĀṣima, 1404H); trans. Gibril Fouad Haddad as The Exhortation to Trade, Industry and Work (Kuala Lumpur: IBFIM, 2013).

6. Abū Bakr ibn Abī al-Dunyā, Iṣlāḥ al-māl, ed. Muṣṭafā Mufliḥ al-Quḍāh (Cairo: Dār al-Wafā, 1990).

7. A good study of his life, thought, and influence is Saeko Yazaki, Islamic Mysticism and Abū Ṭālib al-Makkī (New York: Routledge, 2013).

8. Abū Ṭālib al-Makkī, Qūt al-qulūb fī muʿāmalat al-maḥbūb wa waṣf ṭarīq al-murīd ilā maqām al-tawḥīd (Beirut: Dār al-Kutub al-ʿIlmiyya, 1997).

9. See the study by Yasien Mohamed, The Path to Virtue: The Ethical Philosophy of al-Rāghib al-Iṣfahānī: An Annotated Translation, with Critical Introduction, of Kitāb al-Dharīʿah ilā Makārim al-Sharīʿah (Kuala Lumpur: ISTAC, 2006), and the discussion at 70–75 on the dating of his passing away, and 375–414 on his economic ethics.

10. Abū al-Qāsim al-Ḥusayn ibn Muḥammad ibn al-Mufaḍḍal al-Rāghib al- Iṣfahānī, Kitāb al-Dharīʿa ilā makārim al-sharīʿa, ed. Abū al-Yazīd al-ʿAjamī (Beirut: Dar al-Kutub al-Ilmiyya, 1987), 375–416 passim.

11. Abū Faḍl Jaʿfar ibn ʿAlī al-Dimashqī, al-Ishārat ilā maḥāsin al-tijāra, ed. al-Bishrī al-Shūrabjī (Cairo: Maktabat al-Kulliyyat al-Azhariyya, 1977), trans. Adi Setia, The Indicator to the Virtues of Commerce (Kuala Lumpur: IBFIM, 2011); see also Adi Setia, “Jaʿfar ibn ʿAlī al-Dimashqī on Community, Money and Prudent Management in Trading and Spending: Four Excerpts from his Kitāb al-Ishārat ilā Maḥāsin al-Tijārat,” Islam & Science 9, no. 1 (Summer 2011):11–32.

12. Abū ʿAbd Allāh Muḥammad ibn Aḥmad al-Qurṭubī, Qamʿ al-ḥirṣī bil-zuhd wal-qanāʿa wa radd dhull al-suʾāl bil-kutb wal-shafāʿa, partial trans. Abū Salif Aḥmad ʿAlī al-Adanī, The Secrets of Asceticism (Bristol: Amal Press, 2008).

13. ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn ʿAlī ibn al-Lubūdī, Faḍl al-iktisāb wa aḥkām al-kasb wa ādāb al-maʿīsha, in Risālatān fī-l-kasb, ed. Suhayl al-Zakkār (Beirut: Dār al-Fikr, 1997), trans. Adi Setia and Nicholas Mahdi Lock as The Virtue of Working for a Living: The Legal Rules of Earning, the Ethics of Livelihood (Kuala Lumpur: IBFIM, 2012). Al-Lubūdī’s Faḍl al-iktisāb is largely based on al-Ghazālī’s Ādāb al-kasb.

14. Al-Sayyid Muḥammad ibn Muḥammad al-Ḥusaynī Murtaḍā al-Zabīdī, Itḥāf sādat al-muttaqīn bi sharḥ Iḥyāʾ ʿulūm al-dīn (Beirut: Dār al-Kutub al-ʿIlmiyya). A good study on his life and works is Stefan Reichmuth, The World of Murtaḍā al-Zabīdī (1732–91): Life, Networks and Writings (Cambridge: Gibb Memorial Trust, 2009).

15. (Beirut: Dār al-Kutub al-ʿIlmiyya).

16. “Providing” or “provisioning” rather than “spending” better describes the operative meaning of infāq.

17. The “merchant” here would include all participants in the market.

18. See also the comprehensive, 80-page monograph, S. Mohammad Ghazanfar and Abdul Azim Islahi, Economic Thought of al-Ghazali (Jeddah: King Abdulaziz University, 1997).

19. Cf. E.F. Schumacher and Peter N. Gillingham, Good Work (New York: HarperCollins,1980);seealsotheinterestingwebsitehttp://goodwork.org/about. Obviously, “good” here means wholesome, meaningful and beneficial work, that is true to the nature of the worker (see al-Rāghib al-Iṣfahānī on work ethics in Yasien Mohamed, Path to Virtue,392ff).

20. Recently translated by Adi Setia as The Book of the Proprieties of Earning and Living (Kuala Lumpur: IBFIM, 2013). This is the seventh book so far translated in an informal series of translations of a number of selected Arabic texts in classical Islamic economic thought for the express purpose of reviving an Economics for the Common Good, or the Islamic Gift Economy (IGE). The first is al-Dimashqī’s philosophical and pragmatic al-Ishārat ilā maḥāsin al-tijāra; the second,al-Shaybānī’s ethico-juristic Kitāb al-Kasb; the third, Ibn al-Lubudī’s Faḍl al-iktisāb wa aḥkām al-kasb wa ādāb al-maʿīsha; the fourth, al-Jāḥiẓ’s Kitāb al- Tabaṣṣur bil-tijāra; the fifth, al-Ghazālī’s Kitāb al-Ḥalāl wal-ḥarām; and the sixth, al-Khallāl’s al-Ḥathth ʿalā al-tijāra wal-sināʿa wal-ʿamal.

21. Book 13 of the Iḥyāʾ as a whole, or specifically Book 3 of the Quarter on the Proprieties of Daily Life (Rubʿ al-ʿĀdāt).

22. The life of al-Ghazālī has been well studied, and hence I do not see the need to recount it here. Among the latest surveys of his life and works are the articles published in the Special Issue on al-Ghazālī in the Canadian journal Islam & Science 9,no.2 (Winter2011),especially the article by Muhammad Hozien, “Ghazālī and His Early Biographers,” 95–122.

23. That is, provided they do not become a nuisance to people by resorting to beggary and asking of them, directly or indirectly; on this, see, for instance, al-Khallāl, Exhortation, x-xi, 34–43 passim; or this refers to the rank of the prophets and those who follow their path from among the truthful (Itḥāf 6:248).

24. Indeed, it can be said that the whole of the Iḥyāʾ is concerned about how one is to go about adhering to the ‘golden mean’ in creed (ʿaqīda), devotions (ʿibāda), and transactions (muʿāmala).

25. Kitāb Ādāb al-kasb wal-maʿāsh (hereafter KAKM) 3:238.

26. KAKM 3:238.

27. Ibid.

28. Or, notary public.

29. KAKM 3:248.

30. KAKM 3:250.

31. That is, on all workers, traders and entrepreneurs in general; anyone seeking a livelihood.

32. Or hesitate; that is, he will pause and reflect and take precaution and be scrupulous.

33. Or encounter situations in which these technical or more complex and ambiguous problematics arise.

34. That is, enquire a muftī or fāqih to help him resolve those anomalous problems so as to preempt possible invalidity of his contracts or transactions.

35. Literally, know with a “general knowledge” (as opposed to expert, detailed knowledge).

36. KAKM 3:251.

37. That is, the markets of the Muslims.

38. That is, especially the legal rules governing any particular transaction one is engaged in.

39. Related by al-Tirmidhī, cited in al-Makkī, Qūtal-qulūb 2:262; KAKM 3:252.

40. Or entrepreneur.

41. KAKM 3:252.

42. KAKM 3:289.

43. That is, the business is surviving but not prospering.

44. “Goodness” or iḥsān in the context of the discussion here obviously denotes the meaning of magnanimity, generosity, kindness, and benevolence.

45. KAKM 3:308–09.

46. That is, your share of the world is your share for the Hereafter.

47. KAKM 3:322–23.

48. KAKM 3:322–39 passim.

49. KAKM 3:338–39.

50. KAKM 3:322.

51. KAKM 3:338–39.

52. See al-Shaybānī, Kitāb al-Kasb, 136.

53. Ibid., 164.

54. That is, for themselves, their dependents and the common good in general.

55. That is, all three are interconnected, grounded, in and directed by the same core of ethico-moral values and principles.

56. Related by al-Tirmidhī, hadith no. 1987 (KAKM 3:332).

57. KAKM 3:332.

58. That is, the second of the seven matters that the merchant should take care of in order to fully realize his concern for his religion; KAKM:323ff.

59. That is, communal obligations the discharge of which leads toward the adequate provisioning of public goods and services that are commonly needed in the community.

60. KAKM 3:323.

61. May also be rendered as general good, public good, or public interest, but the term “utility” certainly does not describe it!

62. Ibn Mardawayh in al-Tafsīr; al-Ḥākim cited in al-Makkī, Qūt al-qulūb (see Itḥāf 6:361).

63. Cited in al-Makkī, Qūt al-qulūb (Itḥāf 6:361); KAKM 3:285.

64. Following Qūt al-qulūb, al-Zabīdī says that this person was actually Muḥammad ibn Maslama ibn Salama al-Anṣārī, a famous Companion who died after 40H (Itḥāf 6:258).

65. Uḥayḥa ibn al-Julāḥ al-Ḍārī was a pre-Islamic poet and also of the Anṣār (Itḥāf 6:258).

66. A place in Madīna (Itḥāf 6:258).

67. Al-Ṭabarānī in his three Maʿājim (Itḥāf 6:252); KAKM 3:230.

68. See Yassine Essid, A Critique of the Origins of Islamic Economic Thought (Leiden: Brill, 1995).

69. For a good discussion, see Realli Schechter, “Market Welfare in the Early-Modern Ottoman Economy: A Historiographic Overview with Many Questions,” Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient (JESHO) 48, no. 2 (2005):253–76.

70. For some discussions of the operational meaning of infāq in contemporary Arab-Islamic scholarship, see, inter alia, Muḥammad Aḥmad Maḥmūd Mukhliṣ, Wujūh Kasb al-māl wa infāqih fī ḍawʾ al-Qurʾān al-karīm (Alexandria: Dār al-Jāmiʿat al-Jadīda, 2008) and Maḥmūd Muḥammad Bāballī, al-Kasb wal-infāq wa ʿadālat al-tawzīʿ fī-l-mujtamaʿ al-Islāmī (Beirut: al-Maktab al-Islāmī, 1988).

71. Or unjust.

72. That is, or perpetrators, those who contract and transact according to such unjust transactional forms.

73. That is, a contract may be valid, yet unjust and illicit.

74. Literally, that by which others are harmed.

75. That is, harmful to transactors and third parties, or to the public at large.

76. That is, to the immediate transacting parties.

77. KAKM 3:284; cf. the corresponding passage in al-Lubūdī, Faḍl al-Iktisāb.

78. That is, from his innermost conscience.

79. KAKM 3:

80. That is, the business is surviving but not prospering.

81. KAKM 3:308.

82. See Adi Setia’s translation of The Book of Earning a Livelihood: Kitāb al-Kasb Kuala Lumpur: ibfim, 2011).

83. See Michael Bonner, “The Kitāb al-Kasb Attributed to al-Shaybānī: Poverty, Surplus, and the Circulation of Wealth,” Journal of the American Oriental Society 121, no. 3 (July–September 2001):410–27;

84. Ibn Tamīma al-Sakhtiyānī.

85. ʿAbdullāh ibn Zayd ibn ʿAmr al-Jaramī al-Baṣrī (Itḥāf 6:259).

86. That is, for commerce or plying a trade.

87. Or, “wealth is part of health.”

88. KAKM 3:245.

89. Ghinā has also been translated as “self-sufficiency,” “independence,” and “autonomy” as it can mean any or all four concepts; similarly māl has been variously translated as “wealth,” “possessions,” “money,” holdings,” and “capital”; see Gibril Fouad Haddad’s introduction “to his forthcoming translation of al-Khallāl’s book, entitled The Exhortation to Trade, Industry and Work (Kuala Lumpur: ibfim, 2013).

90. Al-Khallāl, Exhortation, 27–30.

91. Or hesitate; that is, he will pause and reflect and take precaution and be scrupulous; or he will desist from such ambiguous or doubtful practices until he enquires about them and becomes certain about their validity.

92. Or encounter situations in which these technical problematics or complexities arise.

93. That is, enquire a muftī or fāqih to help him resolve those anomolous problems.

94. Literally, know with a “general knowledge” (as opposed to expert, detailed knowledge)

95. KAKM 3:251.

96. That is, on practices leading to usury gain in buying and selling.

97. KAKM 3:269.

98. That is, in regard to hiring and renting (KAKM 3:288)

99. KAKM 3:288.

100. “Know that the acquirement of the knowledge of this subject matter is obligatory on every Muslim earner (muktasib) because the seeking of knowledge is an obligation on every Muslim. Indeed this is knowledge that is needed, and the earner is in need of the science of earning (al-muktasib yaḥtāj ilā ʿilm al-kasb)” (KAKM 3:251).

101. KAKM 3:239ff.

102. Attesting to the virtue of earning.

103. That is, the Sunnah and the Ḥadīth..

104. Al-Ṭabarānī in al-Awsaṭ, Abū Nuʿaym in al-Ḥilya (Itḥāf 6:251).

105. Al-Tirmidhī, al-Ḥākim, Ibn Māja (Itḥāf 6:251).

106. Or beggary in general.

107. Abū al-Shaykh in al-Thawāb, Abū Nuʿaym in al-Ḥilya, al-Bayhaqī in Shuʿayb al-īmān (Itḥāf 6:252).

108. Al-Ṭabarānī in his three Maʿājim (Itḥāf 6:252).

109. Al-ʿIrāqī says he did not find the hadith in this wording; however, Abū Manṣūr al-Daylamī narrates in Musnad al-Firdaws a hadith of ʿAlī that Allah loves to see His servant worn out in seeking the lawful (Itḥāf 6:253).

110. One who has acquired a skill, trade, or profession and is practicing it.

111. Al-Ṭabarānī and ibn ʿAdī (Itḥāf 6:253).

112. Or wholesome.

113. Aḥmad, al-Bazzār, al-Ḥākim, al-Bayhaqī (Itḥāf 6:253).

114. Aḥmad (Itḥāf 6:254).

115. Ibrāhīm al-Ḥarbī in Gharīb al-ḥadīth (Itḥāf 6:254).

116. Cited in al-Makkī, Qūt al-qulūb (Itḥāf 6:255).

117. That is, traditions and reports pertaining to the sayings and deeds of the

Companions and Pious Predecessors (al-Salaf al-Ṣāliḥ).

118. Cited in al-Makkī, Qūt al-qulūb (Itḥāf 6:257).

119. Following Qūt al-qulūb, al-Zabīdī says that this person was actually Muḥammad ibn Maslama ibn Salama al-Anṣārī, a famous Companion who died after 40H (Itḥāf 6:258).

120. Uḥayḥa ibn al-Julāḥ al-Ḍārī was a pre-Islamic poet and he was of the al-Anṣār (Itḥāf 6:258).

121. A place in Madīna (Itḥāf 6:258).

122. A famous Companion.

123. Ibn Yazīd al-Nakhaʿī (Itḥāf 6:258).

124. A famous follower (tābiʿī) of the Companions.

125. That is, because he sees that the one occupied in personal devotions is also striving against the temptations and whisperings of Satan, albeit in a different manner (Itḥāf 6:258).

126. Ibn Jamīl al-Baghdādī of Antioch, a trustworthy scholar of hadith (Itḥāf  6:259).

127. That is, if you are not dependent on others for your livelihood, then it should not trouble you at all if they speak bad of you.

128. Ibn Tamīma al-Sakhtiyānī al-Baṣrī (Itḥāf 6:259).

129. A prominent early Ṣūfī.

130. Ibn Tamīma al-Sakhtiyānī.

131. ʿAbdullāh ibn Zayd ibn ʿAmr al-Jaramī al-Baṣrī (Itḥāf 6:259).

132. That is, for commerce or plying a trade.

133. Or, “wealth is part of health.”

134. KAKM 3:266–269.

135. That is, the two forms of money, namely gold and silver coinage.

136. Literally, excess, surplus.

137. That is, gold dinars and silver dirhams.

138. That is, meeting place of the transaction, or where the transaction takes

place.

139. That is, by way of cash transaction on the spot, or in the place where the transaction takes place; that is, cash and spot transaction.

140. That is, by any time lapse between initial offer and terminal acceptance.

141. That is, raw gold or gold bullion.

142. That is, time-lapse or waiting period or temporal gap between the initial handing over of the raw gold or gold bullion and the receiving of the minted gold coins (dīnārs) in exchange.

143. That is, by surplus or augmenting or quantitative disparity.

144. Or in three types of dealings.

145. That is, different types of metals, like gold for silver.

146. That is, as long as such composite money is not treated as money but as compensation or payment or counter-value (ʿiwaḍ).

147. That is, other than gold or silver.

148. Or a necklace in which the beads are a composite of pearl and gold.

149. Or gold content.

150. That is, with the payment paid on the spot.

151. Or miller of grains and seeds.

152. That is, from the person who produces butter, cheese, and the like from raw milk.

153. That is, by paying in cash on the spot without deferment.

154. That is, for the original unprocessed edible thing.

155. That is, this is because these can be preserved and stored and hence protected from deterioration only when they are dried out or dessicated, not when they are still fresh and wet.

156. KAKM 3:284ff.

157. This is also the Arabic word for monopoly.

158. Abū Manṣūr al-Daylamī in Musnad al-Firdaws; and al-Khaṭīb in al-Tārīkh Itḥāf 6:360).

159. Aḥmad and al-Ḥākim (Itḥāf 6:360).

160. Cited in al-Makkī, Qūt al-qulūb (Itḥāf 6:360).

161. Cited in al-Makkī, Qūt al-qulūb (Itḥāf 6:361).

162. Cited in al-Makkī, Qūt al-qulūb (Itḥāf 6:361).

163. Ibn Mardawayh in al-Tafsīr, al-Ḥākim cited in Qūt al-qulūb (Itḥāf 6:361).

164. Cited in al-Makkī, Qūt al-qulūb (Itḥāf 6:361).

165. A town on the way to Baṣra from Kūfa.

166. That is, proxy or representative.

167. The money of the unwarranted profits, or even all the property of the wheat-trading business without exception.

168. That is, without any qualifications.

169. That is, food that is eaten regularly and constitutes the major portion of a normal diet, like rice, maize and wheat.

170. Or ghee.

171. That is, wait and postpone selling until prices fall to a level at which more people are willing to pay, since food are abundant and they will not buy otherwise, that is, except when prices fall.

172. Or drought or times of poor harvest, or for prices to rise.

173. Or famine.

174. That is, such storing up of foodstuffs.

175. That is, the factors or causes or situations leading to injury and harm to others.

176. KAKM 3:288ff.

177. That is, gold dinars and silver dirhams.

178. That is, the original circulator of the counterfeit money.

179. Muslim (Itḥāf 6:366).

180. Cited in al-Makkī, Qūt al-qulūb (Itḥāf 6:366).

181. Or go out of circulation and no longer used as a means of exchange.

182. That is, the abiding consequences of their deeds in the world after they die, and for which they will also be taken to account.

183. That is, the evil custom that he has initiated and which others put into practice after he has passed away.

184. That is, the trader still sins for his own part in handing the counterfeit dirhām over to the transactor.

185. al-Bukhārī (Itḥāf 6:368).

186. Or with silver water or silver paint in the case of counterfeit dirhāms.

187. Or a piece or bar of silver.

188. Namely, Ibrāhīm al-Nakhaʿī (Itḥāf 6:370).

189. Cited in al-Makkī, Qūt al-qulūb (Itḥāf 6:371).

190. KAKM 3:292.

191. Plural of dāniq, which is one sixth of a dirham.

192. KAKM 3:295ff.

193. al-Bukhārī and Muslim (Itḥāf 6:377).

194. A Companion (Itḥāf 6:377).

195. al-Ḥākim and al-Bayhaqī (Itḥāf 6:377).

196. KAKM 3:308 ff.

197. That is, pricing the merchandise to ensure that some profit is earned from its sale.

198. Or to the market price, such that the profit margin be small or fair, reasonable or customary for the type of merchandise concerned.

199. But rather he insists on the normal market price or fair price.

200. Or what is generally considered the fair price.

201. This means that if the buyer later finds out that the price he paid is actually far above the current market price for that area then he has the option of returning the goods and rescinding the purchase.

202. Or fulūs.

203. In this case, the nephew was frank to the countryman about the real price, but the latter paid more out of his own accord, and so there was no element of concealing the real price or deception or misinformation; but despite this transparency, the uncle refused to accept that extra payment, and deemed it shameful if he did.

204. That is, not an expert, new to the subject, green, greenhorn; or one who is trusting of the seller, or who has no knowledge of the price; here I translate ghabn as ‘overcharging’ since the sense here pertains to opportunistic-pricing that is exploitative (al-ghabn al-fāḥish as opposed to al-ghabn al-yasīr).

205. al-Ṭabarānī, al-Bayhaqī (Itḥāf 6:397).

206. al-Hamadānī al-Yāmī Abū Adī al-Kūfī, judge of Rayy, d. 131H (Itḥāf :397).

207. Or good-hearted.

208. That is, by overcharging people who are not familiar with the market prices, and thus they take the words of merchants at face value and trust them to be honest and transparent. This is oppression if deception or deceit is involved.

209. Or spot price, that is, the price at the particular place and time of transaction, as opposed to anticipated prices in the future.

210. Maternal uncle of al-Junayd (Itḥāf 6:398).

211. A dry measure.

212. A double-entry accounting ledger; in some editions, spelled rūzmānaj; vowelization according to al-Zabīdī (Itḥāf 6:398).

213. That is, that one should neither cheat nor deceive.

214. KAKM 3:320.

215. An assaying tool for identifying precious metals like gold or silver.

216. That is, one usually worn by sufis and ascetics.

217. That is, which may only be indicative of apparent piety.

218. That is, a small dark patch that appears on the brow due to much prostration in worship.

219. That is, a man is truly tested by his attitude towards money, whether he is honest or dishonest in regard thereof.

220. KAKM 3:322ff.

221. That is, your share of the world is your share for the Hereafter.

222. From the context of the discussion, this would refer to the first measure among several measures to be taken in order to ensure that earning a livelihood leads to felicity in this world and in the Hereafter.

223. That is, in the previous two chapters.

224. That is, communal obligations the discharge of which leads toward the adequate provision of public goods and services that are commonly needed in the community.

225. Hadith already documented and discussed in the first book of the Iḥyāʾ, Kitāb al-ʿIlm (Book of Knowledge).

226. Or vocations.

227. That is, not important.

228. Or fortifying.

229. KAKM 3:338ff.

230. That is, in his working for a living.

231. That is, this current chapter.

232. The fourth chapter of Kitāb Ādāb al-kasb wal-maʿāsh is actually titled Fī al-Iḥsān fī-l-muʿāmala (KAKM 3:308ff).

233. For more on this, see Adi Setia, “Muʿāmalah” and “Jaʿfar ibn ʿAlī al-Dimashqī.”

234. al-Attas, Prolegomena, 1.

235. That is, the Return to the Hereafter.

236. That is, in the life of this world.

237. KAKM 3:237–38, 168; cf. al-Lubūdī, Faḍl al-iktisāb, 136.

238. See Charles Eisenstein, Sacred Economics: Money, Gift and Society in the Age of Transition (Evolver Editions, 2011).

239. See Eileen Workman, Sacred Economics, the Currency of Life: A Revealing Look at the Erosion of Capitalism and a Reimagining of the Nature of Genuine Wealth (Writeworks, 2011).

240. See Ernst Friedrich Schumacher, Small is Beautiful: Economics As If People Mattered, 25th anniversary ed. with commentaries (Hartley and Marks, 2000); see also his less-known but equally important book, Good Work Harpercollins, 1980). His concept of ‘good work’ can be fruitfully compared with al-Shaybānī’s al-kasb al-ṭayyib (“wholesome earning”).