Servant Of The Light

Riba

Riba is defined simply as ‘usury’ in Lanes lexicon.

Usury is a certain benefit which is received for the use of the thing lent beyond the return in full of the thing lent, and is not lawful. This is the lawful definition; it is not interest alone; that is simply one expression of the concept of usury.

Usury under the lawful definition has wide application, it prevents all forms of renting that involves no labour, and the problem is people do not grasp the allodial labour concept. Resources must always remain free, only the added value of your labours can be chargeable.

One of the modern terms used in place of usury is profit, not to be confused with the fruits of your labours, this is not profit. Profit is simply an alternative term for usury; profit is the rent on capital, pecuniary gain resulting from the employment of capital in any transaction, as a term it was dormant until revived in World War I; 1912 as a noun. Profitable is from early 14c., meaning "yielding benefit”.

Allodial labour

For example: If I plant a field of watermelons, the watermelons are the bounty of the Creator, grown from the earth and out of the seed, and from the design of the Creator, but the physical labour you invested in the planting of the seed, the preparing of the land, the harvesting and marketing of the watermelons, is what you have honestly earned and deserve in reward of your labour, so when you sell the watermelon, the watermelon itself is free, as it is the bounty of the Creator, but the labour it took to reach its end user and consumer must be paid by the end user and consumer.

Riba must be understood in conjunction with two other concepts of Islam, the first is you cannot hold a monopoly, and second you cannot ‘be’ or ‘use’ a slave.

The definition incorporating these three concepts collectively is ‘the theft of the fruits of another’s labours’.

This can be considered in examples:

If I need a wall building and I find a wall builder and we agree a price of a £1000, we agreement to have the work done, it’s completed and I pay the wall builder the agreed price as he has fulfilled his agreement, this is an equitable trade; there is no Riba (Usury).

If my neighbour see my wall and wants the same as me, but I say I can a get the work done on his behalf for £1500, I again form agreement with the wall builder and pay him £1000, and take the profit of £500 for myself, this is Riba (Usury).

In the first agreement the wall builder receives 100% of the fruit of his labours, in the second agreement he receives only 66%, the agreement was fulfilled as agreed, but the value of the agreement had been misrepresented. The amount paid must always be for the labour invested, if you invest no labour why are you gaining from the labours of the wall builder. Through two agreements you gained benefit, you grant the use of your builder in the first agreement to your neighbour, all loans must be a return equivalent to its full value, but you increased the value, so gained in Riba.

In the second agreement you may inform your neighbour of the benefit you will take from arranging for the wall builder to do the work, so he knows you will gain £500, this does not alter the fact you gain from Riba (Usury), as you have not laboured in the creation of that value, the wall builder has, so you have stolen the fruits of his labours.

You may argue the wall builder has been paid in full, but all the value paid was solely for the labours of building the wall, therefore all the value paid was earned by that action, the wall builder may charge whatever he wishes for his labours, there is no limit placed upon him except what another perceives his labours to be worth, the neighbour perceived his labours to be worth £1500, and so that was the full worth of his labours.

Example two:

If I have £100,000 and I lend it to my neighbour gaining 10% interest per year on my investment, this agreement is Riba (Usury), as I am gaining the labours of my neighbour from no labours of my own in exchange for the temporary use of my money. So I am receiving more than the full return on the thing lent.

You may argue I have lost the use of the £100,000 and deserve compensation, this is based upon the idea that capital generates wealth, which is a lie; the only thing that generates wealth is physical labour, and Riba is taking the labours of others in exchange for no labour yourself, having the effect of stealing the fruits of their labours.

The Islamic model uses allodial labour as the medium of exchange, so if you require an advance upon your labours a local repository system can be established, that can service this for the entire community at no increase. This concept is explained here ‘Repository Finance’.

If you consider the Zionist and Vatican banks who charge interest, the Islamic banks charge a 'profit', all are equal in reality, interest (meaning- to be between) is a profit and their profit is interest, with the Zionist bank you pay interest on the loan at a set rate, or variable rate of interest, so if you repay early you save on interest payments, while the Islamic bank takes the same 'profit', which amounts to the same as the fixed interest Zionist loan, whether you repay over the agreed period or the day after the loan, therefore the Islamic bank is much more usurious than the Zionist or Vatican banks, as they take a return in full and always an increase in full, while the Zionists take return in full with a much lower increase if repaid early.

Let us say instead of lending my neighbour the £100,000 I buy a house with it, and then rent that house to my neighbour so gaining 10% a year on my investment, this is worse than the first riba agreement, as my neighbour can never rid himself of the burden I have placed upon him, the first agreement of a £100,000 loan allowed him to repay the loan and rid himself of it over time, but the rental drains his resources without end, without the reduction of repayments the first agreement allowed as the debt was repaid, so as the principle debt slowly grows smaller the burden of interest is reduced, as it is applied to an ever decreasing outstanding principle loan. The landlord causes more difficulty than the loan shark, he inflates the cost of property through hoarding them, he leverages his properties to gain loans, to buy more properties and has the tenants fund the interest bearing loans, he holds the tenant in subjugation to the rules he invents, demanding bonds, even administration fees, imposing restrictions of use, executed through the threat of termination of agreement making the tenant subservient, and can demand ever higher rental payments, often spending as little as possible forcing the desperate to live in slums.

Example three:

If I buy goods from a farmer and take them to my shop, and then sell them at an increased price from the price I paid, this is not Riba (Usury), as I bought the goods in bulk and so gained a discount, compared with the price of a single product from the farmer, as I took the burden and labours of transporting and selling the produce saving the farmer that task, this means I am selling the produce for a similar price to the farmer for the consumer.

If I am the only supplier and I charge far more than I would be able to in a fair and open market, with independent competition, then I hold a monopoly, and this is theft.

Example four:

If I have a shop and need more help, and I employ a man under agreement to work 40 hours a week at a set wage, meaning I gain the benefit of his labours and he gains the hourly rate I offer him; this is Riba (Usury). He is not gaining a return in full, for the loan of his labours. The man working for me, (the shop keeper) is the victim of Riba, I the Shop keeper am the committer of Riba.

I am taking the fruits of his labours and giving him a part of that as a benefit. Human Slavery- The state of subjugation and control held upon you, of a master owning the fruits of your severe toils, and drudgery in exchange for the ‘benefits’ you receive from your disadvantage.

 Slavery is a relation founded in force, not in right, existing, where it does, by force of positive law.

Each one of us has inherent power, and this manifests as a reciprocal obligation and responsibility towards all around you, no tangible man or woman can enter equitably into voluntary slavery (or self-sale) being a condition of slavery freely entered into, such as an employee for an employer, existing as a waged slave; the protection of the axioms of the land reasoned through a duty of care, function on protection, and the prevention of imposition, this means you cannot equitably make an agreement for yourself or any other to be bound into slavery, even within agreement.

The Qur’anic view is simple, once the concept of allodial labour is understood, you must receive 100% of the fruits of your labours, no man has the right to lay claim upon part of your labours for himself, an example of that would be taxation, a form of theft based upon a section of mankind acting as lice on the body of the people draining their life blood, to exist without their efforts matching their benefits.

Interest comes from the Latin verb "intereo" meaning ‘to be lost’.

The ancient Israelites called usury "a bite". It is like the slow poison of a serpent: "Usury does not all at once destroy a man or nation with, as it were, a bloody gulp. Rather, it slowly, sometimes nearly imperceptibly, subverts the victim's constitution until he cannot prevent the fatal consequences even though he knows what is coming."