ABSTRACT
A poor man walked in the room and asked his rich master for some money, a meager amount as a loan. He expressed his need and explained it in detail as if proving his sincerity. In that moment, I saw the rich master transform from an intellectual into a gladiator. Someone who had been wronged and was ready to fight to claim what was his. He reminded his servant of the debt that he owed to him, which was supposed to be paid off the month before. I was witnessing anger, outrage, and humiliation. It was a sharp contrast to the good natured man that I had known. He was screaming and threatening. The servant was scared, embarrassed, and hurt, leaving the room in shame and misery. I was in a state of surprise and shock, trying to understand the cause of this extreme reaction and questioned my friend. He started justifying his behavior with a clear consciousness as if he was the victim rather than the culprit. He expressed sentiments of self-righteousness and entitlement. As if his show of disapproval was a necessary reaction to avenge the harm that the servant had caused by usurping his money, his private property. The strong was exercising his power over the weak to set right the rules of the game. It seemed that the debt contract had given the lender a sense of self-righteousness and entitlement which justified the exercise of power. The entitlement had changed a civil human being into a perpetrator capable of inflicting violence. It seemed that the debt contract had created a class system of a borrower and a lender, or probably a lender and a defaulter, where violation of one’s humanity became an acceptable act. In a hadith of the Prophet, to the nearest effect, it is said that the worst form of Riba is to disrespect a Muslim. Someone wise once said that the laws are made not for the criminals, who would always find a way to evade them; rather they are designed so good people do not become criminals. It may prevent the ordinary and the sincere, who might be tempted in their weaker moments to go against their good nature and succumb to the passion of their desires. That day I also realized that the privileged might find the debt contract as good and efficient, capable of increasing the welfare of the few. It may not affect them the way it may affect the poor and the needy. The laws of God are not made just for the rich and the successful but for all, not discriminating individuals based on 92their wealth. They are not made simply for the wise and the rational, the intelligent and the educated, but for all. The laws are made taking into account the best and worst of human nature, the nature that compels one to risk their lives to claim a petty benefit. The nature causes one to be obsessed with the immediate at the expense of the latter. The same nature that causes a sense of entitlement among the good people making them pursue acts of violence. The laws are designed not to serve human desires but to prevent the manifestations of their worst forms. Debt contract is apparently the realm of economics and finance, but these sciences do not deal with the good and the bad but only the fulfillment of desires in an efficient way. Hence, it is important that these simple means of exchange between individuals should also be governed by rules of ethics and religion rather than those of markets and efficiency.
