Islamic Banking, Chapter I: Islam And Banking

Chapter I: ISLAM AND BANKING I dedicated my first article to Jamila who really patient waiting this article . I copied this article from Islamic Banking by Adiwarman Karim. If someone want know about him or want to buy it, just contact me ^^ A.

The Coverage of Islam Maybe people will ask “why I explained about Islam first”. Well, Islam rules everything in human life include economic. So I think we should know first about Islam Islam has three major aspect namely aqidah, sharia and akhlak. We start it with Aqidah. I. Aqidah  Faith Aqidah is mean something by which human heart or sublime feeling is tied to. Aqidah is like a contract between we as human and our God. It represent a conscious confession or testimony of the belief and faith the Only One Being does exist, who has creatred the entire universe and whatsoever in it, Allah Subhana Wa Taala (SWT). Islam has 5 faith fundamental (we’ve called it Iman fundamental): 1. Belief in Allah SWT as the One and Only God 2. Belief in the Angels 3. Belief in Scriptures (Al Quran as Holly Scriptures) 4. Belief in the Prophets and the Messenger (Muhammad SAW the Prophet) 5. Belief in the Day of Judgments and 6. Belief in Qadha and Qadhar (Qadha and Qadhar it’s mean the predestination) II.

Sharia  Sets of rule and laws Sharia is defined as a set of divinely presanctioned laws and rulings or prescribed principles by which Muslin should abide themselves so they can relate to Allah SWT as well as other human beings. The application of sharia conforms to human evolutionary civilization as with the sending of the messenger to their respective ummat in their own time. The Process of development of sharia was eventually complete with the Prophet Muhammad SAW being sent to convey Islamic Sharia. Sharia consist of two elements, there are: 1. Ibadah: regulates between human and the Creator. Ibadah principle is “everything is prohibit except there is the rules which allow it” 2. Muamalah: regulates relationship among human beings. Muamalah principle is “everything is allowed except there is the rules which prohibit it” Undertanding sharia contains’s Allah SWT prescriptions and prohibitions which called division of laws or taklifi laws in Islam. These are matrix of taklifi laws: Nature Taklifi Law Prescription Prohibition Option (choice)

Certain Fardhu (obligatory) Haram (Unlawful)

Uncertain Mandub/Sunnah (recommended) Makruh (unrecommended) Mubah (Indifferent)

III.

Akhlak  behavior Akhlak is often called as ihsan defined as “such state that you worship Allah SWT as if you see Him, but since you didn’t not see Him, then you know that He is seeing you” (hadist by Muslim) So how to describes relation between Aqidah, Sharia and Akhlak? Aqidah as our faith is the foundation in human life. Aqidah needs implementation and the guidance for implement aqidah is Sharia, which if well adhered to, will result in good conduct (Akhlak).

B.

Islam and Islamic Banking From the above, we can conclude that since it constitutes an outlook or way of life that regulates all aspects of human life, Islam doesn’t leave any aspect uncovered, including aspect of the economy. There is stipulating that if something must exist before an obligation is considered perfect, is it obligatory to ensure that something exists. In Addition, since economics activities in the modern time may not work well without the existence of banking institutions, it’s obligatory to bring them to existence. In this light, relationship between Islam and baking is quite clear. The guidance to implement Islamic banking are Al-Quran and Sunnah only provide basic principle and philosophies, as well as impart clarifications over prohibitions to avoid. As such, what needs to pursue is identification of whatever is prohibited in Islam. Moreover, anything is permissible and as much as possible we can resort to innovation and creativity.