Is the Riba which is Prohibited in the Quran the same as the Interest of Modern Bank? - Zakir Naik

Is the Riba which is Prohibited in the Quran the same as the Interest of Modern Bank? - Dr Zakir Naik

COGQA-3

Questioner: Good evening sirs. My name is M.S. Shridharan. I am a bank officer. And I will earning my salary from my bank from the banks main income i.e. interest. I have some Muslim friends who have reservations even taking a food or tea from my home assuming that my source of income is from the main interest income of the bank. Please clarify if the interest as mentioned in the Holy Qur’an is the same that the modern bank is practicing, receiving or paying? Once again my question is incomplete I’m sorry. And I have my own professional difficulty of such… I mean… mobilizing the assets from my Muslim friends are lending loans to them also because they involve receipt or payment of interest. Please clarify the procedures.

Dr. Zakir: Brother being a Non-Muslim. He works in a bank he asked a question that why do Muslims resist; don’t come to his house because he’s earning money from interest. What does it say about interest? And he finds a difficulty in mobilizing funds from the Muslims. Brother the Arabic word motioned is Riba. Riba means interest as well as usury. Some people they think that Riba does not mean interest. But it includes interest as well as usury. Interest according to the dictionary means money earned on money lent. And usury means exorbitant interest. Both usury and interest, both are prohibited.

And the Qur’an mentions the word Riba in no less than 8 different places.

In Surah Ale Imran ch. No. 3 verse no. 130, h Ch. No. 2 verse no. 275 thrice, in Surah Baqarah Ch. No. 2 verse no. 276 as well as in Surah Baqarah Ch. No. 2 verse no. 278 and 279.

I’ll just translate the last verse. Surah Baqarah verse no. 278 and 279 says that

“If you give up not your demands of Riba, of interest then take notice of a war from Allah and his Rasool.”

So anyone who deals with interest, gives interest or takes interest, he is waging a war with All Mighty God, Allah and with the Messenger Prophet Muhammad (sallallahu alaihe wa sallah). It is one of the major sins in Islam, one of the major sins. And one Hadith says that one of the lower level of interest is equivalent to doing Zina, adultery with your mother. Now what is the logic behind it? You can hear my talk on ‘Interest free economy promulgated by the Qur’an’. It’s a big talk. For logically for me to prove to you why interest is Haraam. It will take a few hours which will not be possible now. But in short the reason interest is prohibited because it makes a rich person more rich and a poor person more poor and further more, interest encourages many evils. Like if you know in the 80’s most of the banks funded gambling dens, they funded alcohol bars etc.

In Islam we believing in profit and loss sharing. See today, you being a banker, you know the company which has the least debt is a better company. This interest was started by King George the V (5th), the banking system. He is the main culprit. Previously it wasn’t there and now to make the rich people more rich. If a poor person wants a loan from a bank it is difficult. You want to see what is his assets, how much is he earning. So it’s more difficult for a poor man to get loan.

And further more if you analyze the top companies, the top companies they are debt free companies. Therefore today we find stock listing. You know Anil Ambani, he floated the Reliance power. How many? 1.1 lakh corers. He got hundred times more than what he wanted...