About this blog

In recent times a plethora of misconceptions, misrepresentation and myths have been forged about Islam
and Muslims. Many western influentials from politicians, policymakers to judges have taken it upon
themselves to undermine the Islamic beliefs, values and rules so to make it palatable to their
egotistic minds and the secular liberal thoughts.

This blog is dedicated:-

1. To argue the point for Islam in its belief and systems and to refute the misconceptions.
2. To expose the weakness and contradictions of all forms of secularism.

26 Jul 2009

Towards a Tranquil Safe World under the Shade of the Economic System of Islam

You have been witnessing the global financial crisis; the flames of which started in the United States of America and engulfed other countries by the arm of Capitalism and the splinters of globalisation such that no country could be immune to the scorching effects of its flames - however small or far-away it may be. Similarly, you have been witnessing the various 'solution' packages to overcome the crisis being prepared around the world. These solution packages are being drawn up by individual countries as well as alliances and unions in their conferences and summits such as the European Union, the Group of 20 in Washington, and the Lima Summit and the Qatar Summit, etc. But these packages have not resulted in solving the crisis; rather these solutions have at best only provided a short-term and momentary respite, lasting only days or even a few hours before the crisis returns to haunt them again.

A keen observer who examines the rulers and the economists of these countries will find that in terms of these solutions, there have been two approaches to solve the crisis:

The first is the one which has been based upon the shutting of eyes to the very principles of the corrupt capitalist system that caused this crisis in the first place. This category has 'worked out solutions' based on the outward symptoms and not examined the real inner causes behind these symptoms. They have concluded that the financial institutions have lost liquidity; therefore they decided to pump billions and billions to provide these financial institutions with liquidity. They felt that the investments and financial markets are stagnant and frozen; therefore they decided to reduce interest rates on loans in order to encourage lending and thereby stir up the markets. They saw that shares, bonds and financial instruments have lost most of their value and crossed the red-light; so they decided that the state should intervene and buy the fallen shares and bonds.

Thus in their attempts to treat the problem, they focused on the outward and apparent symptoms and closed their eyes to the real basis of the corrupt and failed capitalist system, which was left as it was. They forgot or ignored that the system itself was responsible for the crisis and therefore all their solutions were merely cosmetic, and provided a temporary drug fix to overcome the effects of the crisis for some moments before the crisis re-emerged even stronger and destructive than before. Their examples are that of the man who observes a deep crack in the walls of his house and rushes to fetch some cement mixture and paint to fill and cover the crack and presumes that he has solved the problem and retires to bed for some rest! Moments later the crack re-emerges, not strange or surprising at all, because the man only treated the crack and not the actual deeper cause that caused the crack in the first place, which was weakness in the foundation. Thus, this category was the one that merely covered the crack and ignored its real cause.

As for the other category, the basic principles of the corrupt and failed capitalist system were not totally ignored and solutions for the crisis were sought, however, they restricted their thought and searched for solutions within the two systems and did not look beyond to the third option. They looked at the communist system, which already had failed and disintegrated, and Capitalism which is shaking but not dead yet. They view Capitalism with all its fault lines and shortcomings as better than socialist Communism. Hence for a solution, they approached the critics of Capitalism's failures and asked them: "What is the alternative then?" while fully knowing that there is no alternative and that socialist Communism should not be accepted as the solution and they and their economists do not look beyond these two systems: The failed and disintegrated Communism and rapidly cracking Capitalism on the verge of collapse whose head has not hit the ground yet!

Strangely, this group either neglected or is unaware of an economic system which has stood the test of time over centuries and lasted longer than any other system can boast; has proved safe and provided security, and led people to enjoy economically prosperous and secure lives free from the scaring worries and uncertainties of crises for thirteen centuries, during which time one had to hunt for a destitute person to feed from the bait ul-maal of the Muslims! And yet one could not find the destitute. As opposed to this, there are millions of poor and needy people even in the wealthiest of nations. This is the direct result of economic systems of either Capitalism or Communism, which have resulted in such human hardships and misery.

Indeed, it is strange that this group ignores the fair and equitable economic system of Islam which for centuries provided safe and secure economic prosperity to people without misery and exploitation. This group presumes that there are only two alternative economic systems, Capitalism or Communism and all their efforts and searches are restricted to these two systems alone: either the state sector owns everything or the individuals that constitute the private sector owns everything; there is no third option for them. Either he state owns agriculture, industry and trade, whereby it becomes socialist communist ownership or the companies and individuals own agriculture, industry and trade, whereby it becomes private ownership and free markets and the state would not interfere in the financial markets!

If only this group could look at these economic sectors it would find that they are very different to each other. Owning a deep mine of minerals or petrol is not the same as owning a house or a piece of land; neither is owning petro-chemical plants or various energy generating units or a weapons manufacturing facility the same as owning a cotton weaving factory or a sweet meat confectionery; and neither is owning a railway network similar to car ownership. If this group examines the economic system of Islam, it would find that wealth and properties are grouped into three distinct categories:

The First: These are public properties whose revenues are disbursed among the Ummah after deductions for incurred costs; these include mines - whether of solid minerals or liquids like petrol or gases, etc. - all these are public properties and it is not permissible for the state, or individuals or private companies to own them. Rather, they are public property under the guardianship of the state and the proceeds from these properties are distributed among them after incurred costs are deducted.

The Second: These are the state properties and are used at the discretion of the state, which spends the revenues generated from these for its own expenses and investments in agriculture, industry and trade etc. which are not in the public sector, and also from this may be spent to create balance between people in terms of wealth as has been detailed in the economic system of Islam.

The Third: These are the individual properties which are owned by persons in the agriculture, industrial and trade sector and excluding the public and state properties and are detailed in the economic system of Islam.

Islam has identified these properties with mind boggling precision:

First Example: Transportation:

Islam has distinguished between various forms of transport like those that move on tracks such as the railways, or the electric-operated over ground tramways and trolley buses and those moving on asphalt roadways, etc. like cars and buses.

The first group invariably uses public utility and proceeds along fixed permanent tracks, like the railways that shuttle over railway tracks upon the ground and the electric cable system which uses the over ground or underground tracks. Since these are public properties, these must always be reserved for the public sectors and it is not allowed for the state, companies or the individuals to own them; they are eternally for the public sector only. Thus, the trains, tramways and trolley buses, etc. must always be owned by the public sector under the state supervision and their revenues must be disbursed to the people after deducting incurred costs.

As for the buses and cars, they move over roads that are not reserved in a permanent fashion for them alone, but are capable of being used freely by others. In addition, cars and buses can also be owned by the state as well as individuals which implies that it is permitted for the state, and permitted for individuals and permitted for companies to own them.

Second Example: Electricity:

Electricity is used to drive plants i.e. it is used as fuel for engines, for lighting etc. As for its use in the plants, it is described as 'fire' in the Hadith: "People are partners in three; Water, Pastures and Fire." [Abu Dawud]

Therefore, 'fire' includes all that implied by it in terms of energy, whether derived from burning of trees, coal or electricity, etc. - all of these would be categorised under the public wealth and the state, individuals or companies are not allowed to own these sources of electricity used as fuel to drive industrial plants. These resources are public properties supervised by the state and revenues generated from these are to be disbursed to the state's citizens after deduction of costs.

As for the use of electricity for the purpose of lighting, it is not a part of the public properties and is not implied by the term 'fire'. It is therefore allowed for the state, individuals and companies to own electric generators for the purpose of lighting private houses or offices under the condition that electricity cables are not extended into the public domain, whereby they would be subjected to the public wealth group.

I would only cite these two examples to illustrate the preciseness with which Islam has categorized wealth into three domains.

Despite the fact that this exhaustive and comprehensive system is not merely a philosophical ideology lost in the pages of books, but rather is the economic system that had been implemented continuously for the longest period of recorded economic history; we say that this group of capitalists has chosen to shut its eyes and ignore it without searching it for solutions to their problems.

Thus, this group of capitalists has also failed to find real solutions for the economic crisis because they confined their search to the two failed man-made systems and ignored the truth of the rightful economic system. Their example is that of one who has eyesight but cannot see, and if he opens his eyes he does not ask for the alternative for which he has been searching, even if it were in front of him staring him in the face!

Indeed the economic system of Islam under the Khilafah state is the only system that provides a secure and prosperous economic life, free from calamities and crises for the people. This is the system revealed and mandated by Allah (swt), who is the Creator and knows what is best for His creatures. He (swt) says:

"Should not He Who has created know? And He is the Most Kind and Courteous (to His slaves), the Well-Acquainted (with everything)." [Surah al-Mulk (67): Ayah 14]

[By Sheikh Abu Yasin Ata ibn Khalil Abu Rashta, Amir of Hizb ut-Tahrir, Extracted from the book ‘Towards a Tranquil Safe World under the Shade of the Economic System of Islam’]
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What they said...

“Islam represented the greatest military power on earth…It was the foremost economic power in the world…It had achieved the highest level so far in human history, in the arts and sciences of civilization...Islam in contrast created a world civilization, poly-ethnic, multiracial, international, one might even say intercontinental.”





[Bernard Lewis, Professor of Near Eastern Studies, Orientalist and Historian, 2001]





"There was once a civilization that was the greatest in the world. It was able to create a continental super-state that stretched from ocean to ocean, and from northern climes to tropics and deserts…the civilization I'm talking about was the Islamic world from the year 800 to 1600… Although we are often unaware of our indebtedness to this other civilization, its gifts are very much a part of our heritage"





[Carly Fiorina, ex-CEO of Hewlett-Packard, 2001]





"For the first three centuries of its existence (circ. A.D 650-1000) the realm of Islam was the most civilized and progressive portion of the world. Studded with splendid cities, gracious mosques and quiet universities where the wisdom of the ancient world was preserved and appreciated, the Moslem world offered a striking contrast to the Christian West, then sunk in the night of the Dark Ages."





[Lothrop Stoddard, Ph.D (Harvard), American political theorist and historian, 1932]





"Medieval Islam was technologically advanced and open to innovation. It achieved far higher literacy rates than in contemporary Europe;it assimilated the legacy of classical Greek civilization to such a degree that many classical books are now known to us only through Arabic copies. It invented windmills ,trigonometry, lateen sails and made major advances in metallurgy, mechanical and chemical engineering and irrigation methods. In the middle-ages the flow of technology was overwhelmingly from Islam to Europe rather from Europe to Islam. Only after the 1500's did the net direction of flow begin to reverse."





[Jared Diamond, UCLA sociologist and Author, 1997]



"No other society has such a record of success in uniting in an equality of status, of opportunity and endeavour so many and so varied races of mankind. The great Muslim communities of Africa, India and Indonesia, perhaps also the small community in Japan, show that Islam has still the power to reconcile apparently irreconcilable elements of race and tradition. If ever the opposition of the great societies of the East and west is to be replaced by cooperation, the mediation of Islam is an indispensable condition."





[Hamilton Alexander Rosskeen Gibb, Professor at Harvard University, 1932]





“The Muhammadan Law which is binding on all -- from the crowned head to the meanest subject is a law interwoven with a system of the wisest, the most learned and the most enlightened jurisprudence that ever existed in the world.”





[Edmund Burke, British Statesman and Philosopher, 1789]





"The Exile here is not like in our homeland. The Turks hold respectable Jews in esteem. Here and in Alexandria, Egypt, Jews are the chief officers and administrators of the customs, and the king’s revenues. No injuries are perpetuated against them in all the empire. Only this year, in consequence of the extraordinary expenditure caused by the war against Shah Tahmsap al-Sufi, were the Jews required to make advances of loans to the princes."





[David dei Rossi, Jewish Traveller 17CE, quoted by Norman A. Stillman, The Jews of Arab Lands]





"The notable religious tolerance towards Christians and Jew under Muslim rule had given way to the uncompromising zealotry of Spanish Inquisition. Jews and Muslims thus fled Spain with large numbers of Jews immigrating to the Ottoman Empire which was known for its tolerance to the Jews."





[Graham Fuller, Author and former CIA, 1995]





“If there is much misunderstanding in the West about the nature of Islam, there is also much ignorance about the debt our own culture and civilization owe to the Islamic world. It is a failure, which stems, I think, from the straightjacket of history, which we have inherited. The medieval Islamic world, from central Asia to the shores of the Atlantic, was a world where scholars and men of learning flourished. But because we have tended to see Islam as the enemy of the West, as an alien culture, society, and systems of beliefs, we have tended to ignore or erase its great relevance to our own history”





[Charles Philip Arthur George, HRH The Prince of Wales, 1993]





"...Not being subject to the Sharia, Jews and Christians were free to go to their own religious authorities for adjudication of disputes; but in many cases they went instead to the [Muslim] Qadi"





[Richard W. Bulliet, Professor of History and Author, 2004]





"Here in the land of the Turks we have nothing to complain of. We possess great fortunes; much gold and silver are in our hands. We are not oppressed by heavy taxes and our commerce is free and unhindered. Rich are the fruits of the earth. Everything is cheap and each one of us lives in freedom. Here a Jew is not compelled to wear a yellow star as a badge of shame as is the case in Germany where even wealth and great fortune is a curse for a Jew because he therewith arouses jealousy among the Christians and they devise all kinds of slander against him to rob him of his gold. Arise my brethren, gird up your loins, collect up your forces and come to us."





[In his book 'Constantinople', Philip Mansel quotes a rabbi in Turkey writing to his brethren in Europe where they were facing increasing persecution after 1453]





"Praise be to the beneficent God for his mercy towards me! Kings of the earth, to whom his [the Caliph’s] magnificence and power are known, bring gifts to him, conciliating his favour by costly presents, such as the king of the Germans, the king of the Gebalim, the king of Constantinople, and others. All their gifts pass through my hands, and I am charged with making gifts in return. (Let my lips express praise to the God in heaven who so far extends his loving kindness towards me without any merit of my own, but in the fullness of his mercies.) I always ask the ambassadors of these monarchs about our brethren the Jews, the remnant of the captivity, whether they have heard anything concerning the deliverance of those who have pined in bondage and had found no rest."





[Hasdai Ibn Shaprut (915-990 CE) Jewish physician, chief minister of Islamic Caliphate in Cordova, 'The Jewish Caravan']





"In Baghdad there are about forty thousand Jews, and they dwell in security, prosperity, and honour under the great Caliph [al-Mustanjid, 1160-70 CE], and amongst them are great sages, the Heads of the Academies engaged in the study of the Law…’"





[Benjamin of Tudela, Rabbi in Baghdad in the year 1168 CE, 'The Jew in the Medieval World']





"Those Eastern thinkers of the ninth century laid down, on the basis of their theology, the principle of the Rights of Man, in those very terms, comprehending the rights of individual liberty, and of inviolability of person and property; described the supreme power in Islam, or Califate, as based on a contract, implying conditions of capacity and performance, and subject to cancellation if the conditions under the contract were not fulfilled; elaborated a Law of War of which the humane, chivalrous prescriptions would have put to the blush certain belligerents in the Great War; expounded a doctrine of toleration of non-Moslem creeds so liberal that our West had to wait a thousand years before seeing equivalent principles adopted.





[Leon Ostorog, French Jurist]





"The debt of our science to that of the Arabs does not consist in startling discoveries or revolutionary theories; science owes a great deal more to Arab culture, it owes its existence"





[Robert Briffault, Novelist and Historian, 1928]





"The only effective link between the old and the new science is afforded by the Arabs. The dark ages come as an utter gap in the scientific history of Europe, and for more than a thousand years there was not a scientific man of note except in Arabia"





[Oliver Joseph Lodge, Writer and Professor of Physics, 1893]





“Thus, when Muslims crossed the straits of Gibraltar from North Africa in 711 and invaded the Iberian Peninsula, Jews welcomed them as liberators from Christian Persecution.”





[Zion Zohar, Jewish scholar at Florida International University, 2005]







“Throughout much of the period in question, Arabic served as the global language of scholarship, and learned men of all stripes could travel widely and hold serious and nuanced discussions in this lingua franca. Medieval Western scholars who wanted access to the latest findings also needed to master the Arabic Tongue or work from translations by those who had done so.”





[Jonathan Lyons, Author, Writer and Lecturer, 2009]