Among the riba-based dealings is bayʿ al-ʿīnah (the ʿīnah sale). It takes place when someone sells a commodity on deferred payment, then immediately buys it back for a spot price lower than the deferred price. The transaction is called bayʿ al-ʿīnah because the buyer who acquired the item on credit receives its ʿayn—ready cash—in exchange. In reality this arrangement is nothing more than a stratagem for reaching riba, and it has been expressly forbidden in numerous hadiths and reports. Among them are the Prophet’s ﷺ words: “When you engage in bayʿ al-ʿīnah, cling to the tails of cattle, become content with agriculture, and abandon jihad, Allah will impose upon you a humiliation that He will not remove until you return to your religion,” reported by Abu Dawud. He ﷺ also said: “A time will come upon people when they deem riba lawful by calling it trade.”

Guard yourselves against letting riba infiltrate your transactions or mingle with your wealth, for consuming and handling riba are among the gravest of major sins. Whenever riba and fornication become widespread in a community, poverty, intractable diseases, and tyrannical rulers will inevitably appear among them. Riba destroys property and wipes out blessings.

Allah has set a severe warning for those who consume riba, counting it among the most repugnant abominations and the greatest enormities. He has clarified the usurer’s punishment in both this world and the Hereafter, and He has declared that such a person is at war with Allah and His Messenger. His worldly punishment is that the blessing of his wealth is erased, leaving it prone to ruin and disappearance. How often do you hear of vast fortunes lost to fire, drowning, or flood, so that their owners are left impoverished among the people,