On Economics and Islamic Banking -Part1
By P. P Abdul Razak
I was very much fortunate to have got an opportunity to work in Boubyan Islamic Bank in my second innings of professional life in Kuwait after 27 years of experience in the petrochemical field. Now, having completed 25 months in my new school of incessant learnings, I think it is time for scribbling some distinctive philosophical thoughts that my experience in the bank and study of the subject have generated in my mind. Here, what I would like to share with my readers is mainly philosophical concepts on Economics from Islamic viewpoint, Islamic Banking and its products, its micro and macro economic level impact, money generation and fintech. I will be posting my thoughts on this subject in parts in coming days and weeks..
Cosmological and socio-political orientation of Economics:
Islam postulates its economic philosophy and theory with cosmological orientation. It is a cosmic fact that the universe and all the living and non-living beings in it obey inviolable laws of its Creator. This is what we call Law of Nature. So, Islam demands human being to be in communion with the mainstream of the nature and the universe by surrendering voluntarily his will to the will and law of God in the realms of the life where he enjoys freedom. This is how Islam is defined in nutshell. Both the term Khalifa (Vicegerent and Successor) coined by the Glorious Quran in order to define and describe human being’s status and position in this world and the word Khilafat ( Vicegerency and Succession ) used to introduce Islamic socio-political and economic system symbolize the necessity of unconditional obedience only to Allah and compliance with the divinely inspired value system. The Glorious Quran uses this word (both in noun (Khaleefa) and in its verbal and active participle forms (yastakhlifoon / mustakhlafeen) without adjectival or possessive phrases (without preposition “of” + noun) and object, when it uses this word in its verbal and active participle forms, denotes the fact that each and every human being has to represent his society, environment, future generations through a divinely inspired value system. This terminology of Vicegerent and Successor (Khalifa) in a single word without adjectival or possessive phrases implies our continuity from the past to the present and then our pledge to hand over to the posterity in a better form, representing the divinely inspired value system as a person, society and the state. It corresponds to the very definition of Islam and is complementary to it. It is the same terminology of vicegerency and succession (single word with double meaning) that the Glorious Quran has used in order to define the relationship between human being and the wealth. (To be Contd..)
Lead Structurer (Origination & Structuring), PhD, MBA, Engineer, FRM
2moGreat work Pejman Good to see you work together with Prof. Steven Ongena. Reminds of Tilburg