Chapter: Clarifying Usury and Its Legal Ruling

This is among the gravest of issues: the matter of ribā (usury), which every revealed law has unanimously forbidden and against which Allah has issued the sternest threats.

Allah the Exalted says: “Those who consume ribā will not rise [on the Day of Resurrection] except as one rises whom Satan has deranged by his touch” (Q 2:275). Thus He informs us that those who engage in usury will rise from their graves only like a person seized by epilepsy, staggering because their bellies have become grossly swollen through devouring ribā in this world.

He further warns that anyone who returns to usury after recognizing its prohibition will be among the people of Hell, abiding therein forever: “But whoever relapses—such are the people of the Fire; they will remain there eternally” (Q 2:275).

Allah also declares that He obliterates every trace of blessing in wealth tainted by usury: “Allah obliterates ribā” (Q 2:276). However vast the usurer’s fortune appears, it is stripped of blessing; it contains no good. Instead, it becomes a curse upon its owner— toil in this life and punishment in the next—yielding him no true benefit at all.