THE PROHIBITION OF RIBA (USURY) IN THE FAREWELL SERMON

Abstract

The point of this research article is that the banning of Riba (usury) in the Farewell Sermon was the conclusive pillar in building economic justice in the early Islamic state. Beyond a moral injunction, it examines this declaration as a revolutionary state policy that has destroyed systematically the exploitative pre-Islamic debt economy. The paper follows the progressive revelation of Quran on Riba to the strategic and absolute abolishment of Sermon. It puts this prohibition as part of a wider economic system, in cooperation with Zakat and encouraging of ethical trade to create risk-sharing, wealth circulation, and social solidarity. The article concludes that this intervention created a new paradigm of an economy, which is based on equity and divine justice that opposed tyrannical financial systems.