Islam seeks to facilitate the surrendering to the will of the Creator, which means giving up short-term self-interests for the sake of attaining long-term felicity of drawing near to Him; a difficult task for impatient and myopic humans. Surrendering operationalizes through compliance with a comprehensive and interrelated set of rules governing all dimensions of behavior, including those specific to economic operations such as investment. These rules are derived from the divine objective for humans to establish justice. Therefore, they focus individual and collective behavior on attaining and sustaining justice which, according to the Qurān, was the main reason why messengers were commissioned: to induce humans “to stand forth steadfastly for justice” (Qurān verse 25: chapter 57). Establishing and sustaining justice is to serve the further objective of achieving the unity of mankind.
The Qurān informs that all humans are created from one united soul and that their final destination is back to the Creator also as one united soul: “neither your creation (was) nor your resurrection (will be) except as one united soul” (Qurān 28:31; 1:4). All ordained rules of conduct are directed at achieving this all-important objective. Compliance with the rules—inter alia, hard work, frugality, moderation in consumption, no extravagance or opulence, faithfulness to the terms and conditions of contracts, trustworthiness, truthfulness, patience, forgiveness, cooperation, and sharing—promotes trust, cooperation, integration, solidarity and unity. Their violation—inter alia, cheating, theft, bribery, shirking, lying, hording, backbiting, impatience, abuse of trust, and contract violation—leads to mistrust, discord, disintegration, and disunity. The unity of mankind is a corollary to the central axiom of the Unity of the Creator. Long ago, Muslim philosophers established that from the One Creator only one creation can issue forth.
The rules governing economic behavior are based on the axiom that creation belongs to the Creator. He has provided, in “exact measure,” all the resources required by humans to combine with work in order to produce life-sustaining necessities. At a cosmological-global level sufficient resources, in exact measure, are provided to sustain a comfortable life for all humans at any given moment (Qurān: 49:54). Scarcity can be a binding constraint at the level of individual and perhaps at the level of collectivity. This limited notion of scarcity serves as a vehicle for the test of strength of the humans’ belief in the Creator. Strong faith compels humans to work hard, individually and collectively, to ease the scarcity constraint through the use of resources endowed by the Creator and through sharing income and wealth so that no one would be left without access to the means of acquiring the necessary means to sustain a comfortable life.
Sharing is not a charity but a mandated duty stemming from the axiom that property right to all resources belong to the Creator (Qurān: 26:3). Humans take possession of properties created by their mental-physical abilities combined with the resources. The Creator maintains the “permanence of ownership” on property because He owns all things, including humans who have equal right of access to the resources created for them (Qurān: 70:17) as an expression of the dignity accorded to humans as the crowning achievement of creation (Qurān: 70:17). The right of access and use of the created resources by those who are able to do so does not negate the right of the less able in the final product or its monetized value. These resources are also an instrument for the performance of the duties of office of agent-trustee bestowed on humans. Combined with affirmation of human dignity, the instrumentality of property rights and the principle of “permanence of ownership” of the Creator provide the foundation for the role of sharing as a duty and not as charity. The right of those unable to use the created resources has to be redeemed from either the final product or from its monetized value (Qurān: 19:51).
The remaining income and wealth, after they have become cleansed by redeeming the right of the others, are then available for consumption, saving, or investment. There are qualitative and quantitative constraints on consumption: no extravagance, waste, or opulence; frugality and moderation are ordained. There is also a tax on savings that serves as a disincentive to hording, and the prohibition of interest-based transactions does not allow accrual of any return to savings. This disincentive does not negate capital formation since the only remaining alternative to consumption or saving is investment. It is worth noting that Islam considers excess income and wealth as the life-blood of the economy that should not remain idle and must circulate (Qurān: 7:59). Also important is the fact that, while prohibiting interest-based transactions, Islam simultaneously mandates risk-reward sharing (Qurān: 275:2) and encourages direct participation of financial surplus holder in the project being financed.
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