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Ibn Abi al-Dunya's work, Islah al-Mal (Restoration of Wealth), provides a wealth of insight into various attitudes towards wealth and property prevalent among Muslims in the first few centuries of the establishment of Islam as a world religion and civilization. This article introduces the recently published English translation of the work and maps out the general contours of those attitudes.
Keywords: Ibn Abi al-Dunya; hif? al-mal; wealth, poverty.
Muslims generally know (or should know) that the preservation of wealth (hif? al-mal) is among the injunctions of the religion of Islam, and one of the five maqasid or over-riding objectives of the Revealed Law (al-shari'ah).1 But have they given due thought to questions such as: What is the definition of wealth? How is it defined the way it has been defined by the fuqaha' and 'ulama', and why? How do we actually go about implementing the principle of wealth preservation in all our social and commercial activities and transactions in today's world? What is the whole purpose of this preservation anyway? These are some of the key questions that should spring to mind in any serious understanding of the concept of wealth in Islam.
The word ghina' in Arabic means both wealth and independence, just as, in contrast, the word faqr means both poverty and dependence. In Islam, wealth (as both ghina' and mal) is seen as an aspect of well-being ('afiyah), but only if it is earned licitly and expended judiciously to provide for the needs of oneself and his or her family, so that they remain independent of people, avoid beggary and thereby preserve their dignity, self-worth and self-respect. This financial independence will in turn provide them with the peace of mind and emotional tranquility required for nurturing their inner spiritual growth and purification.2 Moreover, the rich are encouraged to reinvest their surplus wealth into uplifting the socio-economic situation of the poor and needy in their communities. This reinvestment of surplus wealth into promoting the common good (maslahah 'ammah) is achieved through various means, such as charity (sadaqah and zakat), endowments (awqaf), gift-giving (hibah), and bequests (wasiyyah). It can also be achieved even more effectively through various forms of direct people-to-people (P2P) funding and investment based on venture capital (mudarabah), business partnership...