Re: Secular Pakistan
Point is that there are disagreements among Islamic scholars about it. That’s why I quoted that example from Sistani.
**Even what you call Islamic banking is not considered Islamic enough by others.
**
I don’t want to get into too much detail of it, but remember that bank interest of today did not exist in previous times. So all people can do is to interpret Quran and hadith. So to say that interest is forbidden in Quran, is a leap of faith.
http://www.islamicanswer.org/wordpress/?p=1496
the monetary systems of today differ sharply from the old days. Back then gold and silver were the only money.** Their value does not decrease with time.** In today’s economy (since 1971), money is fiat currency not backed by gold. With the massive debts of just about every country, paper money is almost worthless, and decreases in value with time. A lender who gets back his principal only is losing money!
http://archives.dawn.com/archives/67495
Due to lack of basic understanding of the nature and functions of interest, the religious scholars propagate its elimination, being completely unaware of the fact that as “price of capital” interest cannot be eliminated from the economic system.
Besides, minorities like Christians do not agree to Islamic banking at all.