Wealth, good or bad?

I read the following tafsir (Ibn Kathir) from surah Saba' verses 34-39 on the morning of 23 Ramadhan 1430. I think many people today have lost ground of the reality of wealth pursuit. The tafsir below is a good reminder.


How Those Who lived a Life of Luxury disbelieved in the Messengers and were misled by Their pursuit of Wealth and Children

Allah is consoling His Prophet and commanding him to follow the example of the Messengers that came before him. He tells him that no Prophet was ever sent to a township but those among its people who lived a life of luxury disbelieved in him, and the weaker people of the town followed him. The people of Nuh, peace be upon him, said to him:

[أَنُؤْمِنُ لَكَ وَاتَّبَعَكَ الاٌّرْذَلُونَ]

(Shall we believe in you, when the weakest (of the people) follow you) (26:110)

[وَمَا نَرَاكَ اتَّبَعَكَ إِلاَّ الَّذِينَ هُمْ أَرَاذِلُنَا بَادِىَ الرَّأْى]

(nor do we see any follow you but the meanest among us and they (too) followed you without thinking) (11:27). The leaders among the people of Salih said:

[قَالَ الْمَلأ الَّذِينَ اسْتَكْبَرُواْ مِن قَوْمِهِ لِلَّذِينَ اسْتُضْعِفُواْ لِمَنْ ءَامَنَ مِنْهُمْ أَتَعْلَمُونَ أَنَّ صَـلِحاً مُّرْسَلٌ مِّن رَّبِّهِ قَالُواْ إِنَّا بِمَآ أُرْسِلَ بِهِ مُؤْمِنُونَ - قَالَ الَّذِينَ اسْتَكْبَرُواْ إِنَّا بِالَّذِى ءَامَنتُمْ بِهِ كَـفِرُونَ ]

(to those who were counted weak -- to such of them as believed: "Know you that Salih is one sent from his Lord.'' They said: "We indeed believe in that with which he has been sent.'' Those who were arrogant said: "Verily, we disbelieve in that which you believe in.'') (7:75-76). And Allah said:

[وَكَذلِكَ فَتَنَّا بَعْضَهُمْ بِبَعْضٍ لِّيَقُولواْ أَهَـؤُلاءِ مَنَّ اللَّهُ عَلَيْهِم مِّن بَيْنِنَآ أَلَيْسَ اللَّهُ بِأَعْلَمَ بِالشَّـكِرِينَ ]

(Thus We have tried some of them with others, that they might say: "Is it these (poor believers) that Allah has favored from among us'' Does not Allah know best those who are grateful) (6:53),

[وَكَذلِكَ جَعَلْنَا فِي كُلِّ قَرْيَةٍ أَكَـبِرَ مُجْرِمِيهَا لِيَمْكُرُواْ فِيهَا]

(And thus We have set up in every town great ones of its wicked people to plot therein) (6:123), and

[وَإِذَآ أَرَدْنَآ أَن نُّهْلِكَ قَرْيَةً أَمَرْنَا مُتْرَفِيهَا فَفَسَقُواْ فِيهَا فَحَقَّ عَلَيْهَا الْقَوْلُ فَدَمَّرْنَاهَا تَدْمِيرًا ]

(And when We decide to destroy a town (population), We (first) send a definite order to those among them who lead a life of luxury. Then, they transgress therein, and thus the Word (of torment) is justified against it (them). Then We destroy it with complete destruction) (17:16). And Allah says here:

[وَمَآ أَرْسَلْنَا فِى قَرْيَةٍ مِّن نَّذِيرٍ]

And We did not send a warner to a township meaning a Prophet or a Messenger,

[إِلاَّ قَالَ مُتْرَفُوهَآ]

(but those who were given the worldly wealth and luxuries among them) means, those who enjoyed a life of riches and luxury, and positions of leadership. Qatadah said, "They are their tyrants, chiefs and leaders in evil.''

[إِنَّا بِمَآ أُرْسِلْتُمْ بِهِ كَـفِرُونَ]

(We believe not in the (Message) with which you have been sent.) means, `we do not believe in it and we will not follow it.' Allah tells us that those who enjoyed a life of luxury and who disbelieved the Messengers said:

[وَقَالُواْ نَحْنُ أَكْثَـرُ أَمْوَلاً وَأَوْلَـداً وَمَا نَحْنُ بِمُعَذَّبِينَ ]

(And they say: "We are more in wealth and in children, and we are not going to be punished.'') meaning, they were proud of their great wealth and great numbers of children, and they believed that this was a sign that Allah loved them and cared for them, and that if He gave them this in this world, He would not punish them in the Hereafter. This was too far-fetched. Allah says:

[أَيَحْسَبُونَ أَنَّمَا نُمِدُّهُمْ بِهِ مِن مَّالٍ وَبَنِينَ - نُسَارِعُ لَهُمْ فِى الْخَيْرَتِ بَل لاَّ يَشْعُرُونَ ]

(Do they think that in wealth and children with which We enlarge them We hasten unto them with good things. Nay, but they perceive not.) (23:55-56)

[فَلاَ تُعْجِبْكَ أَمْوَلُهُمْ وَلاَ أَوْلَـدُهُمْ إِنَّمَا يُرِيدُ اللَّهُ لِيُعَذِّبَهُمْ بِهَا فِي الْحَيَوةِ الدُّنْيَا وَتَزْهَقَ أَنفُسُهُمْ وَهُمْ كَـفِرُونَ ]

(So, let not their wealth nor their children amaze you; in reality Allah's plan is to punish them with these things in the life of this world, and that their souls shall depart while they are disbelievers.) (9:55), and

[ذَرْنِى وَمَنْ خَلَقْتُ وَحِيداً - وَجَعَلْتُ لَهُ مَالاً مَّمْدُوداً - وَبَنِينَ شُهُوداً - وَمَهَّدتُّ لَهُ تَمْهِيداً - ثُمَّ يَطْمَعُ أَنْ أَزِيدَ - كَلاَّ إِنَّهُ كان لاٌّيَـتِنَا عَنِيداً - سَأُرْهِقُهُ صَعُوداً ]

(Leave Me Alone (to deal) with whom I created lonely. And then granted him resources in abundance. And children to be by his side. And made life smooth and comfortable for him. After all that he desires that I should give more. Nay! Verily, he has been opposing Our Ayat. I shall oblige him to face a severe torment!) (74:11-17) And Allah has told us about the story of the owner of those two gardens, that he had wealth and crops and children, but that could not help him at all when all of that was taken from him in this world, before he reached the Hereafter. Allah says here:

[قُلْ إِنَّ رَبِّى يَبْسُطُ الرِّزْقَ لِمَن يَشَآءُ وَيَقْدِرُ]

(Say: "Verily, my Lord expands the provision to whom He wills and restricts...'') meaning, He gives wealth to those whom He loves and those whom He does not love, and He makes poor whom He wills and makes rich whom He wills. He has complete wisdom and clear proof,

[وَلَـكِنَّ أَكْثَرَ النَّاسِ لاَ يَعْلَمُونَ]

(but most men know not.) Then Allah says:

[وَمَآ أَمْوَلُكُمْ وَلاَ أَوْلَـدُكُمْ بِالَّتِى تُقَرِّبُكُمْ عِندَنَا زُلْفَى]

(And it is not your wealth, nor your children that bring you nearer to Us,) meaning, `these things are not a sign that We love you or care for you.' Imam Ahmad, may Allah have mercy on him, recorded that Abu Hurayrah, may Allah be pleased with him, said that the Messenger of Allah said:

«إِنَّ اللهَ تَعَالَى لَا يَنْظُرُ إِلَى صُوَرِكُمْ وَأَمْوَالِكُمْ، وَلَكِنْ إِنَّمَا يَنْظُرُ إِلَى قُلُوبِكُمْ وَأَعْمَالِكُم»

(Allah does not look at your outward appearance or your wealth, rather He looks at your hearts and your deeds.) Muslim and Ibn Majah also recorded this. Allah says:

[إِلاَّ مَنْ ءَامَنَ وَعَمِلَ صَـلِحاً]

(but only he who believes, and does righteous deeds;) meaning, `only faith and righteous deeds will bring you closer to Us.'

[فَأُوْلَـئِكَ لَهُمْ جَزَآءُ الضِّعْفِ بِمَا عَمِلُواْ]

(as for such, there will be multiple rewards for what they did,) means, the reward will be multiplied for them between ten and seven hundred times.

[وَهُمْ فِى الْغُرُفَـتِ ءَامِنُونَ]

(and they will reside in the high dwellings in peace and security.) means, in the lofty dwellings of Paradise, safe from all misery, fear and harm, and from any evil they could fear. Ibn Abi Hatim recorded that `Ali, may Allah be pleased with him, said that the Messenger of Allah said:

«إِنَّ فِي الْجَنَّةِ لَغُرَفًا تُرَى ظُهُورُهَا مِنْ بُطُونِهَا، وَبُطُونُهَا مِنْ ظُهُورِهَا»

(In Paradise there are lofty rooms whose outside can be seen from the inside and whose inside can be seen from the outside.) A bedouin asked, "Who are they for'' He said:

«لِمَنْ طَيَّبَ الْكَلَامَ، وَأَطْعَمَ الطَّعَامَ، وَأَدَامَ الصِّيَامَ، وَصَلَّى بِاللَّيْلِ وَالنَّاسُ نِيَام»

(For those who speak well, feed the hungry, persist in fasting and pray at night while people are asleep.)

[وَالَّذِينَ يَسْعَوْنَ فِى ءَايَـتِنَا مُعَـجِزِينَ]

(And those who strive against Our Ayat, to frustrate them,) means, those who try to block people from the path of Allah and from following His Messengers and believing in His signs,

[فَأُوْلَـئِكَ فِى الْعَذَابِ مُحْضَرُونَ]

they will be brought to the torment. means, they will all be punished for their deeds, each one accordingly.

[قُلْ إِنَّ رَبِّى يَبْسُطُ الرِّزْقَ لِمَن يَشَآءُ مِنْ عِبَادِهِ وَيَقْدِرُ لَهُ]

(Say: "Truly, my Lord expands the provision for whom He wills of His servants, and (also) restricts (it) for him...'') means, according to His wisdom, He gives a lot of provision to one, and gives very little to another. He has great wisdom in doing so, which cannot be comprehended by anyone but Him. This is like the Ayah:

[انظُرْ كَيْفَ فَضَّلْنَا بَعْضَهُمْ عَلَى بَعْضٍ وَلَلاٌّخِرَةُ أَكْبَرُ دَرَجَـتٍ وَأَكْبَرُ تَفْضِيلاً ]

(See how We favor one above another, and verily, the Hereafter will be greater in degrees and greater in favor.) (17:21). This means that just as there are differences between them in this world -- where one may be poor and in straitened circumstances while another is rich and enjoys a life of plenty -- so they will be in the Hereafter. There one will reside in apartments in the highest levels of Paradise, whilst another will be in the lowest levels of Hell. As the Prophet said, describing the best of people in this world:

«قَدْ أَفْلَحَ مَنْ أَسْلَمَ وَرُزِقَ كَفَافًا وَقَنَّعَهُ اللهُ بِمَا آتَاه»

(He truly succeeds who becomes Muslim and is given just enough provision and Allah makes him content with what He has given.)'' It was recorded by Muslim.

[وَمَآ أَنفَقْتُمْ مِّن شَىْءٍ فَهُوَ يُخْلِفُهُ]

(and whatsoever you spend of anything, He will replace it.) means, `whatever you spend in the ways that He has commanded you and permitted you, He will compensate you for it in this world by giving you something else instead, and in the Hereafter by giving you reward.' It was reported that the Prophet said:

«يَقُولُ اللهُ تَعَالَى: أَنْفِقْ، أُنْفِقْ عَلَيْك»

(Allah says: "Spend, I will spend on you.'') In another Hadith it is reported that every morning, two angels come, and one says, "O Allah, bring destruction upon the one who withholds (does not spend).'' The other one says, "O Allah, give compensation to the one who spends.'' And the Messenger of Allah said:

«أَنْفِقْ بِلَالُ، وَلَا تَخْشَ مِنْ ذِي الْعَرْشِ إِقْلَالًا»

(Spend, O Bilal, and do not fear that the One Who is on the Throne will withhold from you. )

Social capital market

Business.view
Capital markets with a conscience

Sep 1st 2009
Social investing grows up

THE old debate about whether, or to what extent, financial markets are a force for social good has taken on a new urgency in the aftermath of last year’s market meltdown. Plunging the world into recession is, after all, as clear an example as any of anti-social behaviour. As around 800 people gather in San Francisco this week at the SOCAP09 conference, to map out the future of what they call “social capital markets”, they have the wind at their backs.

The first SOCAP conference took place in the middle of the meltdown a year ago. There was a surge of registrations in the days after the collapse of Lehman Brothers, as some people disgusted by the traditional capital markets, and others who had lost their jobs and sought a new outlet for their skills, decided that social capital markets were worth a look. The event proved long on optimism but rather short on coherence. A year on, the thinking is more rigorous—if no less idealistic—and is increasingly being put into practice.
Getty Images Social-capital futures

The idea of combining capital markets with social missions is hardly new. Some investors have long applied an “ethical screen” to their portfolios, avoiding, say, merchants of death (cigarette-makers, defence firms, etc) or companies that are especially damaging to the environment. This has provoked sceptical investors to create portfolios of “sinful” companies that sometimes outperform ethical ones.

As the ethical investors implicitly recognise through their investment choices, much of the activity of capital markets is, broadly speaking, ethical and even socially beneficial. The challenge is to raise the level even higher in areas that are ethical, and transform the capital markets so they channel less money to activities that are “socially useless”, as Lord Turner, the head of Britain’s Financial Services Authority recently put it.

It is now five years since a former American vice-president, Al Gore, teamed up with David Blood, a former Goldman Sachs executive, to launch Generation Investment Management, an investment firm. Nicknamed “Blood and Gore”, it seeks to invest in for-profit firms with strategies that are environmentally sustainable and have the potential to outperform the market. Also in 2004, Christopher Cooper-Hohn set up a structure that automatically pays a large chunk of profits and management fees from his hedge fund, the Children’s Investment Fund, to a charitable foundation for needy children—in total, around £1.5 billion ($2.4 billion) so far.

And a growing number of charitable organisations, led by the Edna McConnell Clark Foundation in New York, have been engaging in “mission-related investing”. In other words, they pursue their philanthropic missions not just by making grants but also in the way in which they manage their endowments, channelling capital to investments that support their charitable goals (in McConnell Clark’s case, by providing debt finance for low-cost housing). These organisations reckon that this approach delivers solid financial returns while achieving far more social impact than the diversified investment strategy still followed by the great majority of foundations and other institutional investors.

Since last year’s market meltdown there has been a sharp increase in interest in these kinds of approaches and several fascinating new initiatives. There has, for example, been much discussion of what exactly might be traded, and by whom, on a “social stock exchange”—a debate that is being informed by some real-world experiments in places such as Brazil and South Africa. (A good overview of the main ideas in social capital can be found in the latest issue of the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco’s Community Development Investment Review. This contains articles ranging from “Rethink Charity” to “Using High-Transparency Banks to Reconnect Money and Meaning”.)
Wanted: a measure of goodness

The notion of social capital markets can seem incoherent because it brings together such a diverse group of people and institutions. Yet there is a continuum that connects purely charitable capital at one extreme and for-profit capital at the other, with various trade-offs between risk, return and social impact in between. Much of the discussion at SOCAP09 is expected to focus on that continuum and to figure out, for any given social goal, which sort of social capital, or mix of different sorts of it, is most likely to succeed.

Arguably the biggest obstacle to the creation of social capital markets is the lack of a common measure of how much good has been done: there is no agreed unit of social impact that mirrors profit in the traditional capital markets. That is why the most interesting event at SOCAP09 is expected to be the unveiling on September 2nd of a new measurement system for investors who want to have a positive “triple bottom line” of social and environmental impact as well as a financial return.

The Global Impact Investing Rating System (GIIRS) is the result of collaboration between some of the leading organisations in social capital markets. It includes a set of “impact reporting and investment standards”, a much-needed attempt to develop common definitions of the main terms used in social capital markets. Until now there has been a tendency to use whatever definition allows you to tell yourself you are making the most difference. It remains to be seen how GIIRS deals with the fact that people often disagree fiercely about what constitutes social good.

Although these are still early days, “This philanthrocapitalist approach has begun to be taken seriously,” says Kevin Jones of Good Capital, a social-investment and consulting firm, and the creator of SOCAP. The amount of money in the social capital markets is still small compared with that in the traditional capital markets, albeit growing fast. Some of the bright new ideas will turn out to be turkeys. (But then so did the version of capitalism that imploded a year ago.) Hopefully, some of them will fly.