I’ve been promising to do a little summary on the position of my school of thought on the use of commercial insurance so here it is. I hold it to be permissible alongside a few of my teachers and very much the minority of the contemporary scholars. I’ll be happy to elucidate further insha’Allah for those who wish to study the subject in detail at one of our study classes.
Insurance
Insurance can be divided in two types: mutual and commercial
Mutual Insurance
This system depends on the voluntary donations of the community into a fund, to be given to needy and deserving members of that community without any third party to administrate the fund in a business fashion. This type of insurance is permissible by the consensus of the scholars.
Commercial Insurance
Here, a third party manages the fund as a business with profit being the intention. The majority of the scholars see this form of insurance as impermissible for the following four reasons:
1. It is a type of gambling (muqāmarah)
2. There is uncertainty in the transaction (gharar)
3. It is against the principle of trusting (tawakkul) in the decree of Allah ‘azza wa jall
4. It is an innovated/new transaction never seen before with conditions other than that found in the Book of Allah
The responses to the above points are:
1. That which has been declared harām is gambling which involves either a guaranteed loss or profit without any form of work or effort expended for that. Likewise, ones intention is to purely profit with no benefit whatsoever for those who lose out. Undoubtedly this will lead to enmity and oppression as Allah ‘azza wa jall states in the Qur’ān.
As for insurance then this is not the case; rather, for ones policy payment one actually receives a real and perceived benefit namely the peace of mind and security over ones wealth and affairs, and thereby does not fear from utter loss. One could also use the example of paying for a security guard to protect ones house. If he has done his job well, the employer will not hear anything more about it but will have received peace and mind in a relative sense. If there is an incident and the guard is called into action, this would resemble the ‘payout’ in an insurance contract. Thus, ones payment is in return for a defined benefit and hence insurance cannot be likened to qimār (gambling).
What also indirectly supports this opinion is that the concept of gambling is quite clear amongst the general people, and concepts are what are understood by its people; one wouldn’t normally assume that insurance is synonymous with gambling.
2. Firstly, as per the well-known and agreed upon maxim, a small amount of uncertainty in the affairs of the people because of their need for it is pardoned by the Sharī‘ah. Secondly, insurance is underpinned by a complicated and detailed industry based upon rules of probabilities and other factors which explains why one is required to respond to so many different questions and provide so much detail in order for the insurance company to calculate a more informed risk assessment. Hence, the uncertainty is minimised by the insurance companies for their own interests too.
3. Having tawakkul in Allah is an action of the internal – of the heart – and does not mean that one cannot utilise the various means provided by Allah to mankind to protect oneself such as one has not gone against tawakkul if one takes an umbrella with oneself if there is a remote possibility of rain or indeed as the Prophet (sallallāhu ‘alayhi wa sallam) would encourage the storing food for a year at a time to minimise possible difficulties later.
4. The underlying principle in contracts is that they are all permissible until something indicates their impermissibility, and insurance is one such type of contract. Also, the well-known narration above is to be understood as those contracts are deemed impermissible which have conditions which contradict the Book of Allah. This is not the case with insurance.
Finally, the scholars who deem insurance to be impermissible allow the public to take the minimum cover possible to ensure legal status in the West, due to the problems and difficulties that would be caused by breaking the law or being held personally accountable in the event of a claim with the absence of an Islamic community insurance scheme.
Although our position doesn’t need to refer to this principle of necessity, it allows those in the West asking about whether they should obtain cover some relief as they try and live within the law of the land, and at the same time follow their own schools of thought without any contradictions.
And Allah knows best.
May 5, 2007 at 7:09 pm
Assalamaleikum Wa Rahmatulah
The objection which have the most weight, so to speak, it to do with gharar – in that the amount you are is unlikely to be proportional to amount of benefit received – either none (no claims) or a large amount (claim made.)
I know that Sh. Mustafa Zarqa talked about this issue and said that on a large scale this doesn’t actually occur due to actuaries acurately computing likelihood of incidents and on mean average the amount paid out is proportional to the premiume received. I think that he was also the most prominent of the dissenting minority allowing insurance.
I couldn’t find where he actually discussed this – and only heard it second hand, have you seen where he discussed it in detail and where?
The other interesting point is that Mutual insurance still has the same primary objections as above (bar it being a new innovated contract) but these are overlooked as it is in a mutual form and not a trade per se.
Hood discussed the differences between Mutual and Commercial insurance in practise here : http://islamiclawetc.wordpress.com/2007/02/24/thoughts-on-insurance-and-islamic-law/
For the purposes of clarity, I take it you are not talking about full term life insurance which is essentially you WILL be paid out at death your invested amount, and is essentially an interest based investment product.
Other interesting life insurance policies are the ones used by tax planners to cover PETs, which are gifts a parent gives to their child to avoid inheritance tax on them – but if the parent dies within 7 years of giving the gift, they still have to pay (most) most of the tax. Ist Ethical have a fatawa from Mufti Taqi Uthmani allowing this type of insurance as the lesser of two evils from what I recall.
And even if you aren’t convinced by Abu Eesa’s arguement, there are still mutual insurance companies out ther (like BUPA) who will gladly take your business.
May 5, 2007 at 9:30 pm
Salamualaykum,
What should the average person do about such issues, can either opinion be taken?
May 5, 2007 at 10:01 pm
As salaamu alaykum
Ustadh,what school of thought is that?
Wasalam
May 5, 2007 at 11:00 pm
Fulan,
Shaykh Mustafa al-Zarka discusses the issue in the Fiqh Academy of the OIC’s research. He then took his research from the OIC meetings, the rebuttals, his answers to them, and a few extra goodies and printed it all in a book entitled “Nizam al-ta’min” printed in paperback by Risalah publishers.
Reader,
While it is impossible to say a modern issue is from a particular school of thought, Shaykh Mustafa was a premier jurist trained in the Hanafi School, may Allah have mercy on him.
(Oh yeah Abu Eesa, ba’d idhnik of course in answering!
May 5, 2007 at 11:50 pm
Ya Ahlan wa Sahlan Hood – I only wish more fellow tullab would come and answer such questions! You’re getting lazier every day!
Fulan:
I’m not too sure whether I agree with you on life insurance, although admittedly I have not studied the issue in detail. Is it really an interest-based investment?
I’m just asking the question – tell me what you think. It’s definitely not qimar and thereby even more halal (according to our school) than normal commercial car insurance. I can’t see how it is an ‘aqd ribawi (I think) as I see it as an investment for his wife and children and the proceeds do not go to him – remember we don’t know how much he will pay in terms of years and what he earns in the end is not for him anyway.
I could be very wrong but this needs time and isolation for me to really think about it. Allah knows best.
Maaz:
The opinion you should follow is the one of your teacher/Imam of your congregation or the one you go to for your fiqh rulings. The only reason I’ve put this up is because I get asked “is car insurance allowed” about 3 times every single day and then when I tell everyone no it isn’t according to the majority, they all want to know the evidences of the minority! So this was just saving a bit of time for the future…
Reader:
When you ask what school of thought that is, then I am assuming that you are asking about the school which allows insurance. If so, then no school as such holds that opinion – only individual scholars hold their own opinion on the issue.
As Hood said, Shaykh Mustapha Zarqa’ (Hood, I’m gonna flip if you EVER spell his name with a kaaf ever again!
) held this opinion and he was a Hanafi mostly, but he had many of his own rulings, the one on insurance being one of them. I can tell you that the massive majority if not all of the scholars of the Hanafi school deem insurance to be absolutely impermissible.
May 6, 2007 at 2:58 am
Zarka Zarka Zarka!
Keep on flipping dude b/c thats the way his family spells it! So take that!
One thing that I have not seen done as a service to out communities is an identifier service, where if there is a mutual company out there that the community go to they are informed of it. Would be a good idea for a research paper or a constant service to the community (someone could strike up a commission on it.)
May 6, 2007 at 9:18 am
Who are the scholars of today in the UK?
May 6, 2007 at 2:36 pm
What was that about BUPA? Does BUPA medical insurance fall under the type that everyone agrees is permissible (mutual)? Insurance confuses me and I tend to avoid it en-masse to save on brain cells by having to read detailed investigations.
The medical insurance provided by my company in Saudi really sucks. I’m category ‘C’ and I found out what the ‘C’ stands for the first time I needed help.
I’ve started just paying doctors whenever I need medical help to avoid wasting time and effort with the company provided plan.
It had passed my mind to see if I could organise a BUPA policy in the UK that could get me into a decent hospital over here when I need but I’ve always equated non-daruri insurance with being haram and automatically dismissed the idea.
An educated insight would be greatly appreciated.
May 7, 2007 at 1:22 am
salaam
what about travel insurance?
May 7, 2007 at 7:30 am
Assalam Aalikum
My understanding is that conventional Mutual insurance is not halal per se but the scholars prefer it to conventional insurance.
This is because the aim of a mutual insurance company is not profit. It is to minimise the cost of cover for the policy holders (who are also the owners of a mutual).
Inshallah, in the next year or so, there will be more companies in the UK that start to offer Takaful, which is the Islamic alternative to insurance. Takaful takes the form of a mutual company, where policyholders own the funds, but a takaful operator will invest in sharia compliant securites.
Currently, the only mainstream provider of takaful is HSBC and they have one product, Home takaful. A new company called British Islamic Insurance holdings will be launcing soon and also some of the mainstream insurers are looking at takaful with a view to issuing products in the UK.
May 7, 2007 at 6:25 pm
Wa ‘alaykum salam
Just a clarification: when I refer to mutual insurance, this is not referring to any of the models found in the market today.
Classically speaking, there was only a type of mutual insurance (some might even call it a “committee” type of structure as kown in desi circles) which was established in a community in case of severe problems faced by one of its members. Sometimes, this money put forward would only be as a loan to be paid back – hence when we refer to al-ta’meen al-ta’awuni (mutual insurance), it is a classical non-profit, non-shareholder structure. And of course, there was no such thing then as commercial insurance.
Nowadays, mutual insurance isn’t what it used to be and those scholars who hold commercial insurance to be haram (i.e. the majority) also hold most of the mutual offerings to be doubtful too. Their consensus of permissibility refers to the classical method and not those such as offered by BUPA or Co-op etc. which they need to study further.
Takaful isn’t much better to be honest but the scholars like it much more than either the commercial or mutual systems and at least you have the senior scholars behind you on that such as Mufti Taqi et al.
Naturally, for our (minority) school, there is no problem with either model today. This also applies to travel insurance and any other type of health, medical or professional insurance.
If I get an opportunity in a few weeks, I might do a proper right-up of this whole subject insha’Allah.
And Allah knows best.
May 7, 2007 at 6:34 pm
Salam Abu Esa
How did Yasir Qadhis walimaah go? Nice food?
May 7, 2007 at 6:51 pm
lol-I was waiting for someone to ask that… funny how that post went missing huh.. musta got in to trouble for leaking top secret information.
May 7, 2007 at 7:05 pm
Atleast im not the only nosey one around here *wink*
May 7, 2007 at 7:15 pm
lol
May 7, 2007 at 7:15 pm
Hood, jazakhalakheirein for the details of the book – I had blank faces when I asked for this book before in Obeikan and in Dar al-Salam (Cairo), now maybe I’ll have a little better luck, inshallah. Though getting hold of a paperback book published my Mo’asasus Risalah doesn’t hold out great hope.
Abu Eesa: wrt life insurance – there are two types, you have the if you die within the time of the policy you will get X amount, and this is no different to any other form of insurance.
The life insurance I am talking about is different, it is also called ‘whole of life’ assurance and ‘endowment’ policies.
The biggest difference which enters into life insurance is that death is guaranteed, the only question is when you will die, so if you insure against death for the whole of your life (not just a fixed period) – eventually you will get a pay out. Which is why life insurance is also called life assurance as insurance refers to providing cover for an event that might happen whilst assurance is the cover an event that is certain to happen.
Yes this is not Qimar – as it is guaranteed, but now you have moved the policy to being just investment (for whom is irrelevant) plus an embeded life insurance policy.
Life insurance is usually available on a single or joint life basis with benefits including paying out on the diagnosis of a terminal illness. If the policyholder is alive when the policy expires no payment is made and, should the policyholder stops paying premiums at any stage, the policy has no value.
There are several types of life insurance:
* Level term insurance – designed to pay out a sum of money if the policyholder should die during the policy’s term. The sum assured is guaranteed and remains unchanged throughout the term.
* Decreasing term life insurance i.e. mortgage protection cover – where the sum decreases during the policy. It is regularly used to protect capital and interest repayments on a mortgage.
* Renewable term insurance – On the expiry date there is an option to continue without a health review.
* Convertible term insurance – Level term insurance with the option to revert to whole life or endowment insurance.
* Increasing term insurance – Due to inflation the value of money declines each year. Consequently, this form of insurance combats that with an escalating sum assured.
* Index linked term insurance – Some insurers provide the option for the premium to be increased each year in relation to the Retail Price Index.
These would all fall under the first type which is mentioned.
Endowment life insurance
These are the equivalent of saving schemes with life insurance attached. They are often carried with mortgages and will pay out any returns at the end of the policy term or a lump sum when the policyholder dies.
This falls under the second category – as investment product with embeded life insurance – ever heard of ‘cashing in your endowment’?
‘Whole of life’ insurance
This guarantees the payout of a lump sum when the policyholder dies, at whatever time that may be as long as payments are maintained. The premiums and sum insured are guaranteed not to increase for the first ten years. However, they are more expensive as a claim is assured. These come in various forms:
* Non-profit whole life policies – A level premium payable throughout life. It pays a fixed cash sum at the time of death.
* With profit whole life policies – Same as non-profit policies but the amount paid on death is the sum assured plus whatever profits have been allocated.
* Low cost whole life policies – These have a guaranteed level of cover that the amount payable on death is greater than the basic sum plus bonuses or the guaranteed death sum assured.
Because this group of policies is designed for life assurance – they WILL eventually pay out – you would use them for example to pay (save) for an inheritance tax bill which is unavoidable. If they are cheaper to use and you intend to abandon them after x years when you no longer have liabilities (i.e. family is married off, house is paid for) then they would not necessarily be treated the same way. But if you look at the intent of this cover – they are intended to eventually pay out, and the ‘with profits’ and ‘allocated bonuses’ are all to do with participating with the (interest based) investment choices of the insurance company – not having an insurance policy with them.
Also all whole of life polices have a ’surrender value’, so you can cancel them and surrender thenm back to the issuer and get a cash sum for the policy – which is based on when the insurance company thinks you will die and the expected payout then.
Interesting dilemma would be, if your whole of life policy has a surrender value – aren’t you due to pay zakat on that?
Esesntially, this whole category (endowments and whole of life polices) are essentially saving schemes with embedded life insurance policies in them – which is why I don’t feel they should be treated as pure insurance policies, and thus would fall out of what you have outlined.
I remember Sheikh Darsh said this years ago when asked, he said (paraphrasing) we allow all insurance except life insurance as death is certain.
The fact that the beneficiaries are the person inheritors is not particularly relevance (though you could say that if the beneficiary was unrelated that would be gambling – akin to taking out insurance that such and such person would die this year.)
Life insurance policies are commonly ‘written into trust’ so they do not on death become part of the person’s estate – and thus do not become liable to inheritance tax.
WRT Mutual insurers, what you have said is interesting – but rather confusing. The whole point of mutual insurers is that they are not for profit, and all profits are re-invested for the policy holders (the members.) Which ostentibly is pretty much what Takaful seems to be trying to do. Though I guess, if you are member in them, you are also liable for their interest based investment policies, as you are no longer just a policy holder.
Reading HSBC’s documents on Takaful – and how they extract the profits, you get a rather surreal feeling in that they are trying to fit a rather square peg into a round hole, and going to great effort to do so.
Abu Ilyas: One think mentioned in al-Kauthar’s ‘The Real Deal’ course by Sh. Tawfique Chowdhury said his teachers (he studied Hanbali Fiqh, and mentioned Sharh al-Mumta) allowed fixed payment for unlimited service but NOT unlimited GOODS – i.e. you can pay for the AA / RAC for breakdown insurance – as long as it is not – you pay for the repair and we reimburse you. But if it is you pay us X a year and we will come an fix your car, that is fine. The cost of the parts and materials is incidental in relation to the labour and was thus overlooked.
Likewise if you could find an HMO or hospital where you for a fixed annual premium will receive medical treatment by them, or a company (Bupa?) who contracts a hospital or medical service provider to provide treatment to you – AND you do not pay the hospital and are reimbursed by them, but instead the hospital and doctors settle directly with the insurance company (or ideally the hospital is owned by the HMO (Health maintenance organization) and the doctors are employees) – this would be looked on more favourably and the mainstream may allow this.
Fulaan
May 7, 2007 at 8:49 pm
Umm(s):
The fight was a kick-off and Mayweather deserved it – fully. But De La Hoya…what a fighter. Fajr ended up in its middle time too.
It all gets more confusing right? Good.
Fulaan:
1. That was very informative about the life insurance/assurance/endowment stuff but what now?
I don’t think you’ve said anything to change my mind that it’s even more ok than normal insurance! But maybe I missed something there…
2. As for me ole’ sparring partner Tawfique then remember one thing: he plays Aussie rules whereas we play the real deal up here and you know Man Utd lit up the footballing world this year.
Tawfique defends the conventional position well, as illustrated by the Najdi opinions on ta’meen. The argument centres around the type of contract we are playing with, in which he wants musawah and mu’adalah in goods and payment within that contract. Obviously, they allow it (and only just!) in a contract of service (i.e. the AA bloke coming out however many times) versus a fixed payment because there is no need for the mu’adalah (i.e. equivalence).
We say that it is not obligatory in our contract for there to be an equivalence in both of them (payment ‘in’ and goods ‘out’) as is known in the issues of sale and the subjective matter of pricing (i.e. qeemah).
Anyway, Allah knows best.
Mayb Hood can shed further light on this being the liberal kinda Najdi that he is…
May 7, 2007 at 9:26 pm
Abu Eesa… it was cruel enough that you posted something about the walimah and then retracted it…and then to just keep us hanging in suspense… tut tut, u should be ashamed of yourself.
May 7, 2007 at 9:32 pm
Umm. I couldn’t agree more.
May 7, 2007 at 10:09 pm
Totally. Nor could I.
May 7, 2007 at 10:33 pm
lol @ abu eesa
May 7, 2007 at 11:59 pm
I think the key point which maybe is not clear is whole of life insurance is in reality nothing more than an investment product, with embedded life insurance to work out how much you need to contribute.
There is no doubt you will die (and the product is for whole of life so at some point in that period you will die and a payout will occur.) This fundamentally changes it from insurance to investment.
The amount that will be paid out will be based upon the performance of the underlying fund your premiums are invested in – so you are now investing and directly involved (unless you have some kind of two way promise shariah compliant asset swap in the middle) in the money and bond market.
Contrast this with term insurance when the whole nature of your contract is limited to whether or not you die and the payout associated with it for the fixed premium, and you don’t care what they do with your premium from a shariah perspective.
This is further highlighted by the policy having a surrender value – which shows it is an investment and has intrinsic value because the insurer has a guaranteed liability (when you die) based on it.
If you have a guaranteed payout the premiums may vary to deal with good and bad investment years, or the payout may vary if you have fixed premium, or you have guaranteed payout, guaranteed premium – in which case the insurers have invested in something obscenely long term like 50 year Gilt, or have resold the market risk to someone else. But in pretty much all cases you have moved from insuring to investing.
Thus it is largely investment product where your premium is invested for you – and the life insurance part is that if you die earlier than expected they will top up your investment, and if you die later you will subsidise those that died earlier.
The risk from the insurers perspective is that they think you will die after X months, which generally will not be the case, but on average you will die after X months for the insured population, which is the insurance part of the contract.
So the crux of the issue is in term insurance you simply have a contract to provide an insured payout IF the event occurs, whereas in whole of life insurance you have guaranteed payout occuring and are investing your premium into the non-shariah compliant investment product.
How to make whole of life insurance shariah compliant (taking the minority opinions that insurance is acceptable)? Change what you invest into into a shariah compliaint financial product, and most of the problems drop away.
If this still fails to convince, maybe you could explain which part of my reasoning is faulty?
WRT Najdi opinions on ta’meen, as they are ‘more’ mainstream they could provide a better way for ppl not convinced by the strength of you opinion to rely on and in the same time get the benefits of medical/breakdown insurance. He did not explain the opinion, he just stated it and moved on as it was an introdctory course.
Fulaan
May 8, 2007 at 12:24 am
Najdi opinions?
Hood a liberal Najdi?
Have you been mixing the wrong chems up there in the Pharmacy Abu Eesa?
Sorry bro I am Hijazi.
Fulan,
I will have to come back to all of your comments, they are detailed and deserve a slow reading.
I don’t think AE is commenting on Najdi ta’meen per se, as much as he is on ultra-orthodox views on contract creation.
Many scholars of Najd though are particularly staunch on most issues of finance, well that is the old-school of them anyways. Most scholars of the kingdom seem to take the standard OIC position on insurance.
I didn’t really understand the differentiation made between the two forms (reimbursement vs. direct settlement) as mentioned or how that relates to “allowed fixed payment for unlimited service but NOT unlimited GOODS” but there is something I am obviously missing.
But I digress, because I am not a fan of pre-modern mu’amalat coverage, and agree with some modern scholars and researchers that the whole corpus of mu’amalat needs to be re-written.
May 8, 2007 at 12:15 pm
Hood:
Keep trying bro. Give it up for the Najdi-deniers!! :-p
And yes, I am commenting on the “conservative” approach to ‘uqud in general which in fairness is well represented by the Najdi (and Hijazi!) scholars.
The issue about reimbursement vs. direct settlement does seem strange but the asl is in the comparison between qeemah, thaman and mithl in the insurance contract. Thus all the modern day derivations which one can go into (and maybe used correctly or incorrectly by Tawfique, you’ll have to ask him to explain) are taking from here. Allahu A’lam.
Fulaan:
If this still fails to convince, maybe you could explain which part of my reasoning is faulty?
Is this referring to me? If so, I never found anything faulty – bil ‘aqs, I think that everything that you’ve written totally supports my position on its permissibility and thank you very much!
Obviously when we say something is permissible, we are not taking responsibility for associated things such as interest investments or interest payouts or investing in non-Shar’i funds. In any case, as you have explained it, it is looks good to us.
He did not explain the opinion, he just stated it and moved on as it was an introdctory course…
And isn’t that the problem here?
(Yasir, I rest my case.)
May 8, 2007 at 1:46 pm
AE: I think we are talking about slightly different things. The issue is a little clearer to me by what you said in your caveat (wrt interest based investments), as what I was arguing against was certain life insurance policies issued by conventional insurance companies – not an abstract concept of life insurance per-se.
To summarise, one objection against insurance companies is that they use your premium to invest in non-shariah compliant products to fund any claims.
The response to this is that it is it irrelevant as all that concerns us is the permissibility of the contract between the insurer and the insured – not how the insure funds its liability (same argument used by Islamic windows of conventional banks.)
The evidence for this is that the Prophet SAW used to do business with the Jews of Madinah who used to carry out riba between themselves.
What I am saying is because certain life policies are merely investments with embedded life insurance in them, and you are participating in the profits of the investment directly – you now have to worry about what the insurer is investing in as it affects the ruling on your policy as you are now investing and they are acting as your investment agent.
So my question for you I guess is does your opinion take into account that the fact that the nature of the insurance company’s investments may or may not affect the insurance policy between the insured and insurer – depending on the nature of the contract (i.e. whether or not it is a ‘participating’ life insurance policy or just a fixed premium for fixed compensation?)
I think we are saying broadly similar things – just I am including the investment behaviour of the insurance company in the equations whilst you are excluding it.
I spoke to my teacher this morning about insurance contracts for unlimited service, and he said that these are not even treated as insurance at all, but are a treated as a type of Ijara contract, he then explained that classically the individual contract is looked at and not the net financial impact of all the amalgamated contracts.
He also commented that traditionally ‘peace of mind’ is not an item which is assigned a pecuniary value.
Out of interest is the ‘us’ in In any case, as you have explained it, it is looks good to us. – the royal we?
Hood: WRT reclaiming the money – the argument from what I understood was simply that in the reclaiming case it is a money(premium) for money (claim) trade (and thus ribawi difference in time and amount) – as the insurer pays you cash in the sense of a claim – this of course applies to all insurance and is one of the standard objections to it.
Whilst in the they settle with the hospital/breakdown ppl/ etc directly – you have (from your perspective) a money (premium) for service trade which is fine from this viewpoint.
You could then argue that in the reimbursion scheme that you act as an agent on behalf of the insurer when you pay them, and they reimburse you later as part of your agency role, and you gain the benefits as the person who is insured.
But that gets complicated by the fact that you have already paid and they have not fully approved your claim until you send it in they have confirmed it (even with pre-approval) so you can not really argue that you are acting as an agent.
An interesting digression from the hadith of the Prophet SAW doing business with Jews who traded in Riba – this is that there is no indication that I have heard of which shows that the Prophet SAW stopped this practise (of riba) between the Jews, much as He SAW did not stop the selling of pork and alcohol between the Christians, etc.
This suggests precedent for the parallel conventional / Islamic finance system being tried in Malaysia – and support (as the products should be equivalent financially) for using Libor to fix rental rates.)
Anyway, back to work.
Fulaan
May 8, 2007 at 3:28 pm
“We” here is representing the minority, i.e. those who followed Shaykh Mustapha al-Zarqa’ and from my own teachers as well, including Shaykh Kehlan.
All answers so far have been what is in Nizam al-Ta’meen when I last read it nearly 7 years ago (I haven’t had a copy since because some so-n-so who borrowed it hasn’t given it back…) and what we went through that bab as we were studying it. Hence, all my responses are up for review and if I do get time to do a bahth on it, I’ll make sure to use current and confirmed opinions insha’Allah.
Anyway, it doesn’t affect the contract intrinsically for what they invest in per se although we should of course try our very best to ensure it is Shar’i compliant. If indeed it is proven that your payout is the pure result of haram then it would not be acceptable. If it was found to have been tainted % wise with haram then the appropriate % in sadaqah would be used to purify it as I detailed in a post last year on this issue (and can’t for the life of me remember where, but it was on Islamiblog).
Also, my original point was about simple life insurance without the assurance aspect but again, that’s seen as investment and thus all Shar’i precautions should be taken to ensure halal investments are made or that the haram is absolutely minimised.
He also commented that traditionally ‘peace of mind’ is not an item which is assigned a pecuniary value.
Then let me say: is there anything that deserves a value more than piece of mind? Indeed, is it not the single greatest characteristic that we pay out of our front teeth for in every object and thing that we buy that is the difference between the generic and the brand, between the sha’bi and the classy, between the white goods and the real goods? Isn’t peace of mind, if offered to us a product, something which we’d pay the top premium for? I know I would and I know I do everyday in all of the different contracts and sales I get involved in for which I pay that added premium.
Of course, many scholars support his statement but my goodness, I don’t think it would be possible for me to disagree with it as much as I do.
And Allah knows best.
May 8, 2007 at 6:17 pm
Oh Abu Eesa too late! The world knows!
so whats the reason behind all the *hush hush* about the walimah? did the food run out? is that it?
hey it happens!
May 8, 2007 at 6:21 pm
hey fellow Umm…tell me, what info did u dig out on the walimah?
May 8, 2007 at 6:28 pm
Jazakum Allahu khayran Fulan.
I’m still confused though and probably will just resort to my “do nothing about it” asl.
I’ve been told that BUPA don’t have an international policy anyway. I think AXA do though.
I guess I’ll just stick to forking out when I’m ill (like last night’s £130 minor operation) until I have enough free time to devote to understanding the points better.
May 8, 2007 at 8:34 pm
Abu Esa,
Weddings are to be announced, aint they? So give us the low down please and stop being a tease.
May 10, 2007 at 1:18 am
ccar insurance
ccar insurance
May 10, 2007 at 6:35 pm
I want the info!!! Im Yasir’s No.1 Fan!!!
May 10, 2007 at 7:05 pm
The Worst Kept Secret Of The Year : Yasir Qadhi’s Walimaah
May 10, 2007 at 10:25 pm
Get over it. Seriously.
May 11, 2007 at 9:13 am
LOL
May 12, 2007 at 2:06 pm
The Messenger of Allah, sallallahu `alayhi wa sallam, said, what translated means, ‘A sign of one’s excellence in his Islam, is ignoring what does not concern him.’ [Related by Ahmad, Malik & At-Tirmithi]
May 14, 2007 at 6:01 pm
Turaabie, get over what exactly? Atleast Im openly asking about Yasirs wedding I aint doing my own undercover investigation unlike some, uffff..
May 14, 2007 at 6:02 pm
P.s. go stick your head in some turaab
May 14, 2007 at 9:33 pm
Sheeeeeesh! Who rattled your cage?
And hope the *undercover investigation* wasn’t directed at me… As al-Hamdulillaah i ‘aint that SAD.
*Turaabie exits the playground*
..(L)..
May 14, 2007 at 9:46 pm
alright people, we’ve had our bit of fun n laugh, get over it. Yasir Qadhi’s number 1 fan…I mean the name says it all. Be a fan of the knowledge sis, not him! Abu Eesa, I call on you to delete all of these nonsense posts (even mine) Lets all take the good advice of our Prophet(S),and thank our brother Amad for reminding us n most importantly, butt out of it! it is of no benefit.
May 15, 2007 at 1:02 pm
Erm NO! Dont delete my comments, im proud of them and myself, you’re just jealous you aint his no.1 fan stick to being no.2 *wink*
May 15, 2007 at 2:48 pm
Girls are so annoying.
May 15, 2007 at 4:21 pm
A great way to check yourself. Once in a while visit ur old posts, comments etc on blogs forums etc and delete or edit accordingly. I did that once and I couldn’t believe some of the stuff i’d written 4 years ago. Allah gives us chance after chance to better ourselves but we don’t always take heed.
sincere advice from someone is a chance to better ourselves, thats only if we decide. to take it though.
Saab, not ALL girls are annoying.