Assalamu ‘Alaikum
A’s and B’s
We have just completed a job and about to be paid for it. We are given an option to be paid A or B. A, the value is stable, there seems to be a basic value which is unchanged. More changes in the upside fluctuation. B has no basic value. If you hold B its value can be stolen from you by various external forces.
It can be changed by the government ; it can be changed by the government creating more B’s, it can be changed by people losing confidence in B’s; it can also be changed by outsiders holding large quantities of it and cornering the market for B’s. However the worse of these is the theft of its value by the government creating more and more of B’s. We don’t even realise the loss of value until we use B’s to buy things; what cost 3 B’s before now cost 6 B’s for example. However we have no choice, we have to use and accept B’s otherwise we will be imprisoned. However we should be grateful for just a prison term, in the early days of history, Kublai Khan’s era to be exact, we could be executed for refusing to accept B’s! So, many citizens said ‘just do it”, like today’s particular obnoxious shoe advert, meaning just accept it, without protest. The government also say to its citizens ‘just do it’ i.e. just accept it. In Latin ‘just do it’ translate to ‘fiat’. Hence B’s are based on fiat i.e. being forced on you by the government. In the early days one uses A to buy and sell things. However wicked governments forces its citizens to hand over all A’s to itself, and ‘fiats” only B’s to be used by its citizens. With A no one can steal its value from the citizens; with B’s the opportunities abound! Isn’t this opportunity to defraud called gharar in Islamic terms? We have not even address the qisas punishment for theft! Aah yes don’t forget in an Islamic finance system we are trying to remove riba from a system of B’s, a system of a thief’s IOU to be exact, which is really what B’s is all about. Hmm, one should remove riba when A is used for buying and selling. But when’s a thief’s IOUs is used instead of A’s and we are trying to remove riba from that system, its farcical to say the least. However the persistent optimist in us hopes that this is just phase one, phase two will be the removal B’s to be replaced by A’s.
It can be changed by the government ; it can be changed by the government creating more B’s, it can be changed by people losing confidence in B’s; it can also be changed by outsiders holding large quantities of it and cornering the market for B’s. However the worse of these is the theft of its value by the government creating more and more of B’s. We don’t even realise the loss of value until we use B’s to buy things; what cost 3 B’s before now cost 6 B’s for example. However we have no choice, we have to use and accept B’s otherwise we will be imprisoned. However we should be grateful for just a prison term, in the early days of history, Kublai Khan’s era to be exact, we could be executed for refusing to accept B’s! So, many citizens said ‘just do it”, like today’s particular obnoxious shoe advert, meaning just accept it, without protest. The government also say to its citizens ‘just do it’ i.e. just accept it. In Latin ‘just do it’ translate to ‘fiat’. Hence B’s are based on fiat i.e. being forced on you by the government. In the early days one uses A to buy and sell things. However wicked governments forces its citizens to hand over all A’s to itself, and ‘fiats” only B’s to be used by its citizens. With A no one can steal its value from the citizens; with B’s the opportunities abound! Isn’t this opportunity to defraud called gharar in Islamic terms? We have not even address the qisas punishment for theft! Aah yes don’t forget in an Islamic finance system we are trying to remove riba from a system of B’s, a system of a thief’s IOU to be exact, which is really what B’s is all about. Hmm, one should remove riba when A is used for buying and selling. But when’s a thief’s IOUs is used instead of A’s and we are trying to remove riba from that system, its farcical to say the least. However the persistent optimist in us hopes that this is just phase one, phase two will be the removal B’s to be replaced by A’s.
Before we address the cries of the unbelievers in respect of the deemed impossibility of removing B’s. Let’s continue to dwell on the thieving nature of B’s so its evil is clear in our mind. Now every month we receive a certain number of B’s, say 3000 B’s, which we use to buy food and stuff for our family. Our naive assumption is that the government have put in place a system where the total number of B’s in the country is unchanged. An unchanged total number of B’s means we can retain the value of our B’s right? We understand if there is for example a fixed total of one million B’s in the country available for buying and selling a fixed number of products of say one million C’s then the number of C’s our 3000 B’s can buy a month is unchanged! However if the number of B’s can be increased while C remains unchanged we can see the price of C’s going up in terms of B’s right? That means if our 3000 B’s used to buy 3000 C’s it can now only buy 2500 C’s. Oops! Who is stealing the value of our B’s? The government is one; they can do that by creating more B’s and you can’t do anything about it. But worse still did you know the government allowed another group of people to wantonly create more B’s? These people accept deposit of your B’s and lend B’s to other citizens. When these citizens deposit B’s again, again it is lent to other people. This crazy system allows B’s to be created out of thin air. You remember, more B’s in the system, means the less C’s you can buy.
Crazy huh? But you don’t question because you are brought up not to question. You are informed people who questions are terrorists and you believed it. Now you recall how when you first started work in the 1980’s your salary was 1,800 B’s. If you wanted to buy a new first car it only costs 14,000 B’s and if you wanted to buy an ordinary terraced house it will only cost you 60,000 B’s. Today the young man starts work at a salary of 2000 B’s but a new car is 40,000 B’s and a new house is 300,000 B’s! But you still don’t question the system because you don’t want to be a terrorist right?
If that is all the effect of B’s, it’s bad enough, but the terrorists know if you leave B and adopt A in your country and between friendly countries, one superpower and its sidekick, who are masters at manipulating B’s, will collapse.
A is gold and B is paper currency. Gold is Sunnah money; Dinar, Dirham and Fulus. Dinar is gold, Dirham is silver and Fulus is small change. Sure there are technical difficulties down this road. Is it really beyond the Muslim intellect to solve these?
Wassalam,
Zahid
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