Abdur Rahman ibn Yusuf Mangera – Prophet Muhammad The First Capitalist including Q&A Part 2
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Bismillah al Rahman al Rahim Al hamdu Lillahi wa Salatu was Salam
ala so you will know Celine while he was off he as you Marina Amma
beret,
I'd like to thank Dr. Koehler first for that really succinct,
and that very succinct, yet sufficiently comprehensive
overview of the historical aspects of,
I guess economics in Arabia, remind me if I use the wrong terms
here, because I'm not an economist, and neither am I a
proper capitalist. Although I think maybe with all of the
variant shades of meanings in capitalism, maybe we could somehow
because I'm a businessman.
I want to start off with a few things, there's many aspects to
this, I'm going to try in the short time that we have to try to
understand the guidance is given. I'm going to deal with it on a
more less theoretical and historical basis, but more of a
practical guidance in terms of what
the Prophet sallallahu Newsom's guidance is, for people who are
doing business, and how
it needs to be underwritten by these ethics. I think that's,
that's very important.
I got my inspiration for doing business, because I remember that
you can do business in many different ways. But it does
require you to kind of go out of your comfort zone, to be able to
sell something, to promote your products, to sell your products to
say something about your products try to convince the buyer,
sometimes it does require you to do that. And sometimes for people
who are shy, that's very difficult. So I was reading a
biography of a really famous Indian scholar, man of great piety
as well, he lived in a small village in western Eastern up,
which is one of the provinces of the Indian subcontinent. And he
wasn't very well off, but he wanted to serve the people. But in
order to become self sufficient, so that he could earn his own
money, he decided that what I'll do is I'll go to the close city,
and buy vegetables and other products that are not so easily
available in the in the village, and I'll come and sell them. He
said, he did that. And as he's standing on his stall, trying to
sell these things, he became so embarrassed, you know, to have to
stand and sell that. He just couldn't do it. He was a very shy
individual.
Just as a side point, he was such a celebrated scholar later that
the Hindus probably revered him than more than even the Muslims
because he worked so hard for that area in general. In fact, they
wanted to name a train after him. Because in India, trains are named
after famous people sometimes.
So then he said that, as he's writing about this, in his in his
biography, as this has been written, he then quotes a hadith
which I had in mind myself, but then he gave it a reality. He
says, he quote, I mean, these are the two Hadith that I have in
mind. One is a third year of Sudoku, Amin, a tajoura, Sudoku,
Amin, Barnaby and I will sit duty in our Shahada.
What that means is the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam said
that the trustworthy and the truthful and trustworthy trader is
going to be gathered with the prophets, the champions of truth,
and the martyrs on the Day of Judgment. Now, we know that those
three categories of people in Islamic theology are considered to
be the highest levels, then there'll be in the highest levels
of paradise. So if you want a shortcut, or a path to to be with
those people, then being a trader who's trustworthy and truthful.
Now, that might sound really easy. But there's the next Hadith, which
I want to put into perspective here as well. Now this hadith, you
have to understand the construction of it as well the
Prophet sallallahu sallam said, to juggle your Sharona yo multi multi
food job at two djaro Your Sharona Yama, Yama, the food Jaren
innominate, Taka robot Raja Sadhak Hadith written by man tyranny, the
NDP no matter. Now in this one, this is what the Prophet said.
Lawson said and look at his expression, he said. And it seems
like a universal principle that he's he's mentioning, he's saying
traders will be gathered on the day of judgment as transgressors.
So, in a sense, he's as though he's saying all traders, on the
Day of Judgment will be gathered as transgressors. And then he
makes some exceptions. Now in the way he said this, it actually
indicates that there's a propensity in trading that causes
you to
Started exploiting line because of the greed that human has human
humans have for for more, because that's a human failing wherever
you go around the world and whenever you look in history, the
aspect of greed, which is to make more and more and then sometimes
to use deceptive means of making more of releasing that wealth,
which is in the hands of potential customers to come and buy from
you. So then he said this, he says, The to jar the traders on
the Day of Judgment will be gathered as transgressors, except,
except the one who is fearful of God. So there's that, regardless
of whether somebody is watching or not, whether the customer knows or
not, God is watching, while Barbara and he is always
fulfilling any obligations that is upon upon him or her fulfilling
oaths or any other promises that they make what sadaqa and they
tell the truth about products, they tell the truth about what's
being sold. That's why to emphasize this point, once the
Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam was going through the
market, and he saw that
he saw that somebody had placed the wet seeds below the dry seeds.
Now, if the if the seeds are wet, they're going to be heavier in the
scale, but on the top, it looks dry. So when the person is buying,
he expects he's going to get more than what he'll actually get later
on. So now,
if you look at what the jurists mentioned, how much profit Are you
allowed to make in Islam? How much profit Are you allowed to make in
Islam? So the jurist have a very interesting statement, it says
that you can make as much profit as you want.
But it's disliked to do so. But it's valid. So that that would not
mean how much to make, that's obviously going to be a very
subjective point. But at the end of the day, there's a few things
which are prohibited. What's prohibited, for example, is
holding. And holding here means holding staple products. I don't
mean, somebody knows that Louis Vuitton is going to close down
tomorrow. So what they do is they go and buy up all the bags that
are on sale out there, knowing that these are going to become
really expensive next month, right? Because the company is
closing down, people want their product. So he goes and holds that
weights for about four months, and then start selling them for 10
times the price. No, that's fine, you can do that. Right, because
luxury products are not staple products. But if somebody does
that for wheat, or for for salt, or anything else of that nature,
which people need, that you hold it, wait for reduction in the
market supply to diminish, and then you try to sell and you're
trying to sell when people need it most, that is not compassionate.
So there's some really clear distinctions made down there. So
going back to my story,
it's all of these points that have to be kept in mind for traders to
be successful. It's very difficult for I guess, the point that's
being made here by the Prophet Muhammad peace be upon him is that
there is a lot of inclination, a lot of temptation within business
to do things wrong to make an extra buck. Don't give yourself up
to that don't don't allow your weakness to succumb to these to
these kinds of deceptive ways. For example, if I purchase something,
for if I purchased this pen from the states that cheaper down there
than they are here, it's across tech three, you know, he has a
pencil, and a black pen and a red pen, right in this very small
form. And that's why I like it a lot. I've been using these for the
last 10 years or so. Right? If you look in England, they cost about
40 pounds, the cheapest, but in America, they cost $20. Now, I
could order them from America with a friend that's coming back and
can bring me 20 of them. Now I can try to sell them here at 40
pounds. Now sometimes to make a sale, what people will say is I am
only making two pounds, profits on a profit on here. That's just an
encouragement. People use all sorts of stuff, they swear an
oath. And I've dealt with that when I was studying in India, I
would go to buy cloth for to make some of these, you know, these
garments with and they would they would show me cloth that was 40
rupees a meter. And they would show me a cloth that was at rupees
a meter, and 120 rupees a meter. And I would tell them, I was a
student at the time and not too wealthy. So I was interested in in
the 40 range. And I would say how is this cloth says very good
cloth.
And I buy it, I'd get it made and then suddenly it stopped coming as
a part of this scheme. And he'd given me a lifetime guarantee and
he'd sworn an oath on it as well. Then I take it back and I say you
gave me a guarantee. He says yeah, but that's if it's not
made now you've sewn in so it's not allowed anymore. That's pure
deception. Right? That's pure deception. Why couldn't he just be
honest enough and say, Look, if you really want good cloth, get
this 80 rupee range, this 40 It's gonna mess up but they want
because they want you to buy at the range they think you can buy,
are they gonna make a sale regardless. So that's what you
call deception the Prophet Muhammad peace be upon he really
discouraged this swearing oaths, which, which traders tend to do.
So we use these kinds of attitudes, oh, I'm only making two
pounds on there. It's on clearance. No. Now I don't have to
tell them how much I got it for I can sell this pen at 100 pounds. I
don't have as long as I don't say I'm only making this much on it.
It's completely fine for me. But if I say I'm only making two
pounds on this, and I'm actually making 20 pounds, then that is
unlawful for me. So that's really on the practical level is that now
on the macro level, which is the, you know, after the banking
problems we had in everything. If there's one thing that the Prime
Minister has praised Muslims for
and made a big deal out of it was the Sukuk sale. It was the Islamic
share sale, the Islamic form of the Sukkot because they say or is
it last year? I think it was last year one and a half years ago.
Right? He came on and he praised it because there it's money. It's
money. I'm getting into the politic political aspect of it. So
let me get back to this.
The province a lot sallallahu alayhi wa sallam. These are some
of the rulings that underpin trade in Islam. After everything that
Dr. Koehler said, these are law, your Hindu man, woman, a Muslim in
Allah BTV enough See, he know Muslims wealth, and that because
they were generally dealing with Muslims. So that's why the Prophet
sallallahu sallam said Muslim, but this refers to me, you can't
deceive a non Muslim, in in a normal situation, that's not
allowed either. You know, because that's deception. So it's not
permitted to take the wealth of a, of a person of a Muslim, except
with their heart's content, unless they're satisfied. Now that that
covers a lot of ground and has many applications. That could also
mean for example, if I left a plate of sweets there, or if the
organizers here they haven't, but if they left,
a tray of sweets, or baklava, or Muay Thai or something there and
said, everybody that's coming in, they'll take a piece, now somebody
comes in and says, that's free, I'm going to take five pieces, is
that allowed or not? And as Scott has discussed, and said, what is
the intention of the person who has who is giving this? What do
you think is their intention? Their intention is that as many
people as possible take from this, so they get rewarded more for
this, not that one person takes more and other people are
deprived? So this is a Hadith that will govern that aspect as well,
that I'm taking somebody else's wealth that they've left for me,
how much do they want me to take? Okay, want me to take one piece,
maybe two pieces, right? And that's that, then you will take
from that. So these are the kinds of things that govern these
aspects. Another narration, it says about the Prophet Muhammad
peace be upon himself because he's, he's a trader, he's a
businessman. And there's a lot of a lot of virtue given to doing
business. That's why I think England is probably a good example
of Muslims doing a lot of business because mashallah, in this
country, Muslims are well settled in many businesses, right,
especially the first generation, a lot of them, that's what they did.
When I was in America, most people are not into business. They're
more into
academia, they're more they're more into working for someone. I
think there's a general encouragement to do business.
There's a general encouragement to get into business and do some kind
of business. It's a sunnah. So my inspiration for doing business was
after reading that scholars inspiration that after he read
those two narrations, and he said that maybe this trade which I need
to do, anyway, will also help me to elevate my status in the
Hereafter, as long as I'm truthful and trustworthy in what I do. So
that's the essential element to fight, to fight with yourself with
our greed, with this idea to make a quick buck. Right, all of these
schemes that you have and so on, right?
That's, that's the most important thing. So it says about the
Prophet salallahu Alaihe Salam cannot accept a nasty, more
militant, he was the most excellent in dealing the Prophet
Muhammad peace be upon he was the most excellent when dealing with
others and what cannot be this this love herself and Tadahiro
Minho whenever he he sold something
whenever he sold something on credit, so they're what they used
to
have his date palms, for example. So people would come in six months
in advance maybe a year in advance and say, I want to purchase
everything on that tree. So you'd have to be done. It can't be done
too much in advance it has to be done after they're right and after
they are grown to a certain degree, I buy all of those for
this this amount of money. So, they reckon or they will say I buy
10 kilos or 10 tonnes or whatever it is. So it says that whenever he
would do any trade of that nature called a pharaoh Minho, he would
always give back more, he would always give back more not see the
argument in this will always be I promised you this much. Not that
much. I promised you this quality, not that quality. I promised you
good ones, not defective ones. So the Prophet Muhammad peace be upon
always encouraged personal other personal adept means excellent
repayment. Excellent repayment doesn't mean interest actually
means paying on time. It means you see what happens nowadays is if I
give somebody a loan, and they come back to, to to be repaid,
I'll say, Oh, I haven't got my money yet. Come back next week,
I'll probably pull a few weeks like that, you know, this is what
generally people do. It will take about two months finally, and then
they say, Okay, I finally got your money. But you have to come here
and make them jump through hoops to get the money. And this is a
major problem. That's why there's an Arabic saying, which is a
Corrado make Rodell muhabba, which means to give a loan is to give a
loan is an old loan giving is a scissor a sever of, of love of
friendship, because that's what it does.
They say that it's actually sometimes you get more rewarded
for giving a loan with honesty, then you get for sadaqa.
Sometimes, because with sadaqa, you've given you've only given to
what x what you can expect to lose to give out, then you forgotten
about it. With a loan. It's constantly on your mind. There's a
deal that has to take place afterwards. There's a lot of more
al-mulla that has to take place. So
the Prophet sallallahu Sallam actually, when he made a deal with
somebody, he said two things, he said, BarakAllahu like if he Alico
ematic May God bless you in your wealth and your family, in the
magic that was Salafi, Alhamdulillah adapt, that
the recompense the payment for this kind of a deal is both praise
and fulfilling the repayment or repaying in full. So you praise
them as also you give a dua as well, then
there's a there's one incident when
the Prophet Muhammad peace be upon him, he saw, there was actually
this Jewish rabbi who wanted to, he saw in his books, that these
are the signs of the last prophet. And he noticed most of the signs
he identified most of the signs in the Prophet Muhammad peace be upon
him. But he said, there's two signs that I haven't noticed yet,
which I haven't seen yet. One is that the more silly you are with
him, the more foolish you are with him. That's how much more clever
and forbearing and patient he becomes. And the other point was,
was Tim, it was similar to that. So what he did was he made a
purchase with him, saying that he had to give him a certain amount
of produce on a particular date. He comes two or three days in
advance. And he says, he grabs the Prophet Muhammad peace upon his
cloak, while he's standing along with Omar for the Allah one. And
he said, he grabs it. And he says, he says, I looked at him sternly
in the face. And I said, Where's my products?
So now remember, it's two or three days before. So now the Prophet
Muhammad peace be upon him. So he's showing this with example,
here.
He,
before he could say much, he also said he became very personal than
the this Jewish rabbi. He said, You children have Abdulmutallab,
you always have a problem in repaying debt. You always mess
around like this. Now, that is really serious for you to say
about somebody's tribe, because now everybody else stands up, or
are they gonna stand up? And he said, What kind of respect to
this? If it wasn't for something, I'd fear I would do this to you
and I would do that to you. And the Prophet Muhammad is just
calmly smiling, watching this scenario, and then he turns on to
Omar or the Allahu, and he says to him, I would have expected you to
say something else. We're in need of different we're in need of a
different advice. He's in need of the advice that he should be. He
should give some time when he comes and asks for
His repayment, and you should tell me that you should pay on time.
That's what you should be telling me. Then he says to him, What are
they alone now take him and go and give him what is owed to him and
give him an additional 20 On top, you know, give him an additional
10 or 20. I can't remember the exact amount, give him that
additional amount on top as well. When the person saw this, then he
said, I only did this to test you. Right. But this wasn't the only
this wasn't the only time that this happened. This happened on
many occasions like this, where the prophet Muhammad peace, we
would always encourage good repayment, not make people jump
through hoops to get their money back, which is essentially trying
to determine it and use the money for longer. That's why he said
mottle honey Eagleman a delay of repayment of the person who has
the ability to repay that is oppression.
So it's oppressive to delay in repayment when you've got the
money. There's another Hadith which
is a general guidance in this regard. It says that the Prophet
sallallahu alayhi wa sallam
jargon or the Allahu Anhu relates the soul of Allah and Allah some
said this as a an overarching
encouragement you can say he says Rahim Allah Who Rajul and Subhan
Rahim Allah Who Raju then some hand either Bara were either stara
what either Tala Iman Behati. relaxes, and Muslim both. So what
he said is that may God have mercy on the one who is somehow now
somehow it means a number of things. And I think they all apply
here. It means magnanimous, large hearted,
generous, kind,
tolerant, merciful, forgiving. So God has May God have mercy on the
person who is have this quality of these qualities when he is
selling, when he's buying and when he is fulfilling. So this is a
general guidance in this regard to be easygoing, generous, and that's
why there's another Hadith in which abou Herrera the Allahu Anhu
relates
that there was a trader who
used to deal with people he used to give people products to and
they used to pay him back, or he used to give people products on
sale. So is it distributor of some sort or supplier of some sort? For
either I might say, Ron, but whenever he would see somebody now
in difficult you can't repay on time, he would tell his workers,
he will tell his laborers his workers that
give him some more time, overlook his delay, law and Allah Who Yetta
Jaya was one, maybe Allah will overlook us as well overlook our
wrongs, our wrong deeds as well. So Allah forgave him, Allah
forgave him.
And in the narration of wisdom actually adds that Allah said that
if he was forgiving my bonds, people meaning My servants, then I
am more rightful to do this, that I should forgive him as well. So
you've got a lot of these encouragement to have ethics in
your business, whether you're selling, whether you're buying, if
you're selling, then you make sure you tell the truth. That's why the
Prophet Muhammad peace be upon him. He said, When the buyer and
seller tell the truth about their products, then, and when the buyer
and seller both tell the truth about the products that they
exchanging, then they will be blessed in it. Otherwise, they
won't have blessing. I give you a very typical example.
Car dealers
I just have to say that people have a smile on their face. I
don't know why codeine is no offense to car dealers, by the
way. But there seem to be a kind of a stigma attached to car
dealers, for example. So let's not talk about car dealers. Let's just
say I want to sell my car. And my car has a problem in the sense
that it when it you start it up, it makes some weird noises and
it's not smooth. But once it's running for about 15 minutes to
half an hour, then it's very smooth. So I've put it up for sale
at the market value of a decent car of that age and model and,
and state. Now what I do is somebody calls me and says in I
put it on Gumtree, somebody calls me and says, can I come and see
your car? I said absolutely. What time you're gonna come he says,
you know 930 I said absolutely. So I go at nine o'clock and I want my
car up.
So when he comes at 930 it's smooth. And he buys the car
thinking it's a good deal. What's he going to do tomorrow morning?
He's going to swear at me
right he's going to start okay I can write everything as seen sold
as seen you know that sold as seen
that's sometimes a very deceptive, you know, a way of kind of
justifying, we're not supposed to do that, yes, we're not supposed
to say, oh, there's a scratch here, you know, there's this,
that's obvious things that are obvious in a second hand car that
people can see for themselves. That's what they're buying.
They're not buying a new car, but they don't expect to get something
with a problem in the engine, unless you mentioned it. Those are
things that are expected to be known, right or expected. So
that's how you deal that's how you're told to do that. Now, you
may have made, I may have made an extra 200 pounds, or 400 pounds,
or maybe 500 pounds, right, because that value, the value
should have been 500 pound less with that knock in the engine.
Now, although I have 500 in my hands, but there's no blessing in
that 500 that I'm going to Swan squander in no time because
there's no blessing. So that's why the profit might be stored inside
the buyer and seller must tell the truth about their product that
they exchanging. Right? Because, you know, sometimes people would
exchange things as opposed to buy things with money, you know, you'd
exchange it for some service or, or some other wheat or grain or
something like that.
So we've got numerous
We have numerous guidances in this regard.
If you if you look at the time of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa
sallam, I've actually got a talk on this on zamzam. academy.com on
Abdul Rahman live now for the Allah one I find him one of the
best examples for us in this time, where we are in this capitalist
world where mashallah not just capitalist but today, especially
in in the West of England, we're enjoying prosperity. In fact, you
don't have money here, you can still be spending because you have
credit cards. Somebody just sent me an email today he's racked up a
credit of 16,000 behind.
I can't even mention it. That's how easy it is to the you don't
have money you can still spend
16,000 on haram right? And now he doesn't know how to get out of it.
So we're talking about a time when prosperity is coming as the
Prophet Muhammad peace be upon him predicted this. He said, there
will be a challenge for you a fitna a trial trial of prosperity
where wealth will come from under your feet. And subhanAllah. You
know, we are all sitting here wearing
what we would like to wear. Right? I don't know if anybody's wearing
handouts. But we all sitting here wearing what we would like to
wear. We have We are considered very wealthy compared to people in
the Middle Ages and other times where we would be considered to be
high class,
high earners. And yet we would consider ourselves not to be very
well off today. All of that is very relative. But if you look at
the Sahaba, if you look at the Sahaba and the hierarchy of the
Sahaba of the companions
you have people like Abu Huraira, the Allah Han, who is very poor,
sometimes he didn't find food, the people of the sofa, right, who are
the students who will be at the back of the mosque, they will lie
down on the ground in hunger waiting for somebody to take them
in. Now, if you look at the top 10 Sahaba. We know we have a
hierarchy of the ashram Aubuchon at the top 10 given glad tidings
of Jannah paradise. If you look at the top 10 out of them for
multimillionaires, extremely wealthy individuals with mono the
Allahu Anhu most of you will know about. Then you have Tulsa Abner
Obaidullah, you had Zubaydah Iowa and Abdul Rahman him now and I
really love Abdullah and now for the Allah one, because he was just
such a great individual. One of these caravans that you spoke
about, the ILA if you Quraysh ILA for him relata schita, you will
save the Quran refers to this E love agreements that they had
agreements in place going up north, to Sharm to Levant and they
had agreements going down south to, to Yemen and beyond. So in
their trade tariffs on the ILA in the summer, they would go in one
direction in the winter, they go in the other direction. So Allah
mentions that the ILA few Quraysh II love him relata schita. It will
save Phil Yeah, Boo Rob Bahal base. Now because of what Allah
had facilitated for them, they should worship the Lord of this
house. That's what Allah is telling them. At the end of the
day, it all comes back to worship, but
I'm turning that over the alarm was so wealthy was so wealthy,
that once his trade caravan came back into Madina, Munawwara after
doing its trade,
I shudder the hola Juan who is sitting in her home, and she hears
this massive commotion, dust has been lifted up to the skies.
What's going on? Is there an army that's come in? No, it's
Abdurrahman, even our house trade caravan that's just returned with
all of its profits and goods and everything. And she made a remark,
right, this shows the ethical underpinnings of this right?
Nothing wrong with having lots of money. It's what you do with it,
and what it does to your heart so
She said,
Yes, the Prophet Muhammad peace be upon him has said that Abdul
Rahman under oath is going to get into paradise crawling on his
knees. He's going to go to Paradise, but he's not going to be
standing. Somehow those words reached him. And he just looked
down and he said, Yes, but then the Prophet Muhammad peace when I
told him to remedy that situation, and you know what he did, after he
heard that he gave the entire proceeds of that caravan, he gave
it all the way in the path of Allah. That's, that really takes a
lot because the only way he can do something like this is because
it's not in his heart. It's in his hands, earn lots of money and
spend lots of money. In fact, there's been many pies
individually they do ours, oh, God, give me lots of money. But
with well being, and allow me to spend lots to help people. That's
why the Prophet Muhammad peace be upon him said on one occasion, he
said that there will come a time when the only thing that will be
of benefit will be dinars and Durham's,
which means money by the way dinar this is these are Roman terms,
they are not Islamic terms, though. It's it's Arabic term,
they seem to be today dinar and Iran. They actually from the
Byzantines, they're not from. They're not from Arabic
originally. So
we have full guidance gettable. To finish off kita boo boo, the book
of trade and commerce in books of faith and Hadith, filled filled
with complicated discussions. Of course, things have moved on. And
scholars are now
providing legal rulings for new eBay trades and which are really
complicated because they take from both sides. They this is just a
practical example. eBay trades, they take money for you to feature
on their site, the product, then they take a commission as well as
your proceeds. Whereas we don't generally have a model of that we
have a model of either rent or commission, not both. So that's a
new case to legislate on. Anyway, that's a different case. Just take
a look here for for listening, simple. Raise your hand and I'll
just call you up. So, gentleman in the back, would you mind standing
up? Say your name, please? And then who you're asking your
question to before you propose your question.
When I put this forward to Dr. Benedict, do you think the title
capitalist is deserving of somebody who's so revered? In
Islam such as the Prophet Muhammad peace be upon him? Yes, absolutely
did. Muhammad was an economist in from my point of view, he actually
invented economics, economics, and capitalism is not what you say.
It's how you go about approaching economic issues. It's setting
incentives, understanding how people act, what is their
interest, and then finding a wave so people can live and work
together for the common good. So capitalism isn't about people
being honest, or dishonest capitalism is a particular
approach to economics, I would have heard that capitalism is the
percentage of people who are honest or dishonest, is no higher
in one particular outlook on life than in another. But capitalism is
different, not because of something that's intrinsically
moral about it. It's different because it's intrinsically
economic, in the way it assesses costs and benefits in the way it
deals with people. And it deals with issues. Capitalist approach
to economics means you're always exploring new ways for going about
for bringing goods to the market. Now, as regards the the other
issue, the pension plan, that's another of the immense financial
innovations of the time. It's absolutely correct. There weren't
before prior to Islam, there already were rulers who undertook
a census of the population. But the census that was undertaken by
governments prior to Islam always for this was for the sake of tax
assessment to increase the tax base. And Alma was,
turned it around on his head, because he undertook a census in
order to find out what is the total population to provide
subsidies to everybody and a pension plan to everyone. So it
was funded from the state goods from from state goods, but looking
after people, and being entrepreneurial is in my view, not
a contradiction.
But you are absolutely correct in saying, I've made I was your name,
that Mohammed has been described as a precursor of socialism. There
is a biography that was written in the 1890s. And
the author's name is Herbert grimmer, I don't think it's ever
been translated. But in the 1890s, welfare states were just coming
into being and he was, and he writes very early on in his
biography, well, when you look at the kind of life that Mohammed
had, where did he grow up? He grew up in Mecca, where there were
enormous differences in wealth.
And why was Islam attractive? Well, because he leveled incomes
through zakat. So
So therefore, and then he goes on, and then you can see where this is
going to go going to go. And he quotes all of the individual
sewers in the Koran that exports compassion. And as Abdul Rahman
was just mentioning earlier on, and he says so and that's, that's
then his conclusion is inference. So Mohammed was really a socialist
before they had a word for it. So that view exists. So I don't want
to pretend it doesn't.
Without trying to justify the term, because that's something
what I was told is
a term that was kept to make it a bit more controversial as well.
However, I mean, capital, these are words, words don't have any
necessarily intrinsic sacred meaning. And as there's a
statement in Arabic, says, Lama Shah had to fill istilah, which
means that you can have a term, you can change this definition
depends on how you define it. And I know today that capitalism is
become synonymous with aggression, and
oppression, and so on and so forth. But I think what, what Dr.
Cole is trying to do is to try to speak about it in a very neutral
kind of state. Having said that, and when you say about the welfare
state, not everybody's going to be successful in business, or even
take up business. So not all the Sahaba were business people. And
the Prophet Muhammad peace be upon him, he gave up his business,
primarily after because of the occupation, with prophetic duties
as a prophet, as a leader, as an Imam, as a teacher, and so on and
so forth. In fact, he so wanted to do so many of the things that he
also said that if it wasn't that I had all of these other
occupations, I would also do the other one, he led the prayers, but
he had somebody else make the event, but there's sort of there's
so much virtue in the call to prayer that he said, I would have
loved to do that as well. But then that would obviously take a lot of
my time. You look at Abu Bakr, Siddiq, or the Allah on the first
leaf, same thing, he was a trader, he was well known to be a trader.
But as soon as he became the Hadith, he was given a stipend
from the treasury, because he was no longer able to work his
business anymore. You can't you know, you can't do to both things,
because that time, businessmen, a lot of commitment. So however, as
you carry on with this, you know, some people doing business, then
the poor being dealt with through Zakat and tbaytel. Man, as you
say, we did have one period later on during
just before the end of the first century, Hijiri, just before the
end of the first first century, because amadablam disease, that's
when he died, when he became the Khalifa, just two years and four
months, two years and four months, he managed to by that time, Islam,
it spread throughout North Africa as well. He managed to level the
ground so much in terms of people's
economical status, that there was nobody in North Africa at that
time, who would accept his guts.
Right? So there's a there's a, there's a lot of detail here that
needs to be looked at. What communism is, is that when they
saw a discrepancy between the extremely rich and the very poor,
they decided to take the aspect of equality, and invented communism.
So what what was a kind of a need of the time they made it, they
made that into a policy and an absolute theory. And likewise,
then what you're quoting of the Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon
him establishing these welfare states, etc. The same can be said
that he was a politician, because he did politics, not again, in the
current form of politics, but he had a political system put in
place. It's when you take any of these to the extreme that it
becomes problematic. But when you leave the Prophet Muhammad peace,
loving Him in His comprehensive state, as a teacher, as a
businessman, as a shepherd, as a father, as a grandfather, as a
husband, as an Imam, then that's the true status of the Prophet
Muhammad peace be upon here. Are there any other questions from the
audience? That's the cost constant challenge that I have, when I get
questions from people who are in different fields, fields and
industries. And today, it's actually very difficult because
one of the things which the Prophet Muhammad peace be upon him
predicted as well is that
interest, usury will become extremely rife. And so there are
many, many you consider many obstacles and hindrances in the
process of business that what the scholars have had to do. I mean,
just simply insurance is a problem. Right? For most scholars
will say insurance is a problem. However you rent an office
building. You're a medical doctor, you're a dentist, you have to have
insurance, otherwise you can't.
There's no way you can work.
Can your occupation. So now what the jurists have done is that
they've had to come to terms with this, and legislate that way. It's
a side product. And it's not the, it's not the main goal of me,
you're making money, it's just for safety, otherwise, you can't
function in your vocation, they've allowed these issues. Now, there's
obviously people who will be willing to take it beyond that,
that then becomes an issue of your conscience, and what's harder than
haram. So there's some, I think one of the ways that the jurists
will look at it is the concept of removal Bilwa, which means a
common calamity or a common occurrence or a common problem.
For example, credit cards, it's something which, if you don't
have, there's a lot of things that you can't do, there's very few
people who could probably survive without a credit card. If you have
to rent a car, you have to get this or that you need a credit
card today, there are people who will stand out to this and but for
most people, it's difficult. So the scholars will have to
legislate, to bring some kind of relief, which means some kind of
leniency in the issue. So what we'll have to do is we'll have to
look at certain issues as common problems that everybody is going
to be afflicted or most people in that vocation, there's a lot that
that vocation is represented broadly. And there'll be other
individual unique issues, you know, these unique schemes of
evading tax or unique schemes of doing this or that now that
obviously, would, we would probably say, avoid that, because
it's not a common issue. So day by day, these things are constantly
changing, because the mechanics behind this whole industry is
changing. So we're constantly on our feet trying to determine these
things.
Are there any other questions from the audience?
as you suggest,
it seems to be that the financial I guess, products or ideas that
were that came out of Islam and traveled into Italy, inspired
European capitalism, how is it so that the narrative of the
enlightenment or Renaissance or the development of Europe seems to
be antithetical to Islam? And nowadays, we have a kind of
discourse that seems to suggest that as long as inherently
backwards, Europe is the beacon of development. And you seem to
suggest that, in fact, development, due to inspiration, I
have no idea why this was forgotten. I think in the Middle
Ages, this was everything I said, would have been completely, you
know, people shrug their shoulders and say, we totally know this.
Because it was it was common, it was common knowledge, I have no
idea why all of a sudden, this kind of silted up, and seems to
have been forgotten. It's very, very odd.
Last year, we've we've now put the centenary of 1914, behind us and
how everything changes. But as I was working on Islamic history, at
the time, I was looking at what's changed in the appreciation of
Islamic history, because even in secondary literature about Islamic
history, up to 1914, it was everything I said tonight was
pretty standard knowledge. So, why that happened after what's
happened over the last 100 years? I have no idea. I have no idea why
that came about. But it was not controversial for a very, very
long time. And there's just one other point because you mentioned
the European enlightenment. As you may be aware, there are some
people who say that John Locke, Adam Smith, they probably were
aware of Islamic philosophy and economist, for example of
Gonzales.
But there weren't very many translations. But it's not
something where I'm knowledgeable. But I know that there are some
people who assume that the enlightenment itself so that our
great tradition of the 18th century, they knew Islam much
better than people did later.
There was a question the back over that.
Yep, yeah, in my opinion, he practically invented economics. He
didn't. There have always been people who acted in economics. But
he is the first person who is a political leader, where you can
tell the fingerprint of an economist, because he sets
incentives, and a capitalist is somebody who takes that into
account in his actions. So it you probably are familiar with the
term Chicago economics, in my opinion, it's called Chicago
economics because that's where people worked it up. But if people
would call it by where it started, it would be called Medina
economics, because he and all they're actually doing or had
economic approaches to solving issues.
That coming up to a close so we'll take maybe two or so more
questions, if there are any remaining. Are there any last few
questions from the audience?
Because if not, I have a question.
You mentioned that I guess it kind of links what both of you said you
mentioned that the Prophet Muhammad peace be upon him didn't
allow for fixing prices. So my question, I guess is what is the
Islamic perspective on the minimum wage given that it's a fixed
price? And does it standards permissible?
So good question. Again, I can't give a formal opinion on that
right now. But just thinking aloud, if there is widespread
abuse of people, because today, again, on a practical level,
what's going on is you've got a lot of illegal people, people with
problems with their paperwork, or they don't, they don't have
citizenship. And places are being raided constantly to find out if
they have any illegal workers there.
So now, what's happening is, again, I mean, I don't know if
this is even a great idea. But what's happening is that if they
do find work, they literally paid about two pound an hour. There was
somebody I was told about who was being paid to pound an hour,
because he's illegal, nobody's willing to take the risk, because
there's huge penalties are involved. So now, if there is
widespread oppression of workers, but then that's difficult to
understand as well, because markets right themselves was that
the invisible hand that we speak about. So people are only willing
to take on work at something they would value of receiving.
So I don't know.
I'll have to look into it.
can have your contact details, please? Yeah, absolutely. Perfect.
And I think that, unless there are any final questions from the
audience, I'm going to pass it to Sarita to give the closing
remarks. He's got question. Sure.
Can we have Islamic economics within the current prevailing
economical system?
Very difficult. And that's been the challenge is in front of these
Islamic finance scholars. That's why what you're going to have and
you do have within the famous world renowned Islamic finance
scholars, Mufti Taqi with money check Nippon Jacobi, etc, you're
going to have varying shades of conservativism in that and
leniency in that so you've got some who are on the very
conservative side. And they allow
very limited types of products, while others are looking at the
fact that it's very difficult to have a proper Islamic system. So
they are allowing many other products that
the first group would consider to be stepping beyond the limits. So
it's very difficult to have a proper system is extremely
difficult, if not,
some products will be completely impossible, I would think.
Can I take permission to take one last question away?
From it said we didn't want to fix prices because it's in the hands
of God. Would you say that's the basis of supply and demand? Yes,
in my opinion, that's absolutely yeah. So he leaves it to market
forces to adjust prices. Yes, I think so.
I'm, I'm going to ask you to have a conversation with with the
speakers perhaps at the end of the event, just because of time
because we're scheduled to finish at eight oh, that's okay with you.