Talk:Usury

Definition

"The Quran forbids usury and interest. Quite a few states in USA have laws against usury. Usury is defined as excessive interest. A Dictionary defines usury as "an excessive or inordinate premium for the use of money borrowed", "extortionate interest", or "the practice of taking exorbitant or excessive interest." The Arabic language also makes distinction between interest (Fa'eda) and usury (Reba). The Quran forbids Reba or usury.

My view is that Earning interest and paying interest is perfectly acceptable, but Quran has prohibited interest. Interest is an essential component of the financial aspect of an individual or an organization. Individuals may need to save money in a bank, may carry a credit card for convenience, or may borrow and pay interest for an automobile or to own a house. Borrowing money and thus paying interest for business loans is an essential component for business and organizations. Thus paying interest, as long as it is not considered excessive by the standard of the day and community, to a credit card company, to a financial institution for a loan of any kind (business, car, house mortgage) is allowed and perfectly legal from a Quranic point of view. Also earning interest from a financial institution like a bank or bonds or mutual fund is also fine.

As defined above usury is excessive interest. Unlicensed or illegal moneylenders (mafia as a well known example) charge usury, excessive interest. Such unlicensed or illegal moneylenders are all over the world and can easily be accessed by a few inquiries. For those who live in USA, any individual can find out about these moneylenders by asking about them within their ethnic business community. These illegal moneylenders have entirely separate standards for making loans - they charge excessive interest (usury) and usually rely on someone's life (guarantor) as collateral. The Quran forbids in dealing with usury - borrowing money and paying usury or earning money by charging usury. The Quran specifically states that usury cannot be equated to commerce or taken as a normal business practice. The practice of usury, unfortunately, is prevalent all over the world with individuals and business engaged in this practice.

In practical terms as long as we are dealing with any state-licensed institution like a bank, Mortgage Company, Credit Card Company, etc., we are not violating any Quranic commandment as these institutions usually follow the law of the land and do not charge excessive interest. They calculate their interest rate on daily basis considering the status of the economy and the need of the society. However, if we deal with the illegal moneylenders who practice usury, we are in violation of clear Quranic commandments. This is not to say that one may not borrow or lend money to a friend or relative and even charge interest. Such transaction must be in writing as the Quran cleary commands in verse 2:282 and may involve interest, to at least pay for the cost of the loan to the lender if any, and compensate for any change in the value of the currency over the time of the loan, but should not involve usury."

Your answer as Muslim is totally Wrong. As Islam do not allow any INTEREST to be charged, is Haram. It's funny how u call it verse instead of Surah ! I think either u are not muslim or u are stray. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 118.173.147.246 (talk) 15:48, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

Untitled Stuff

I noticed that Jesus is one of the historical figures mentioned who condemned usury, but I didn't see any New Testament references under Biblical Injunctions. Is there perhaps evidence of this in non-Canonical works?

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I was always under the impression that there were references in the new testament to this. I'd also like to see evidence of these views from any source.

Some say his condemnation of money-changing in the temple was simply because the money-changers were in the wrong place, and that he had nothing against this or other forms of usury. If so, we should remove the claim that he "spoke out against" usury, even though he was presumably opposed to it (since his silence implies support of the old testament's injunctions against it). Biblical scholars, can you help here please?

Wragge 17:15, 2005 May 27 (UTC)

Didn't Jesus give a parable in which he negatively portrayed someone who passed up an opportunity to loan money at interest?

The previous question probably refers to the parable of the talents (Matthew 25:14-30, Luke 19:11-27). Three servants are each given large sums of money (a talent was a sizeable unit of weight; the parable refers to that weight in money). Their master is going on a trip. Two of the servants trade (or perhaps invest) the money, doubling it, and returning the total to the master on his return. The third servant buries the money in the ground, and returns only what he had been given. The master rebukes him and says that at the least the servant might have invested the sum with bankers "and on my return I would have received what was my own with interest." (Matthew 25:28, NRSV). Interpretations vary, but this passage would not seem a condemnation of interest or the servant wouldn't have been rebuked for not investing the money. 69.138.9.90 01:11, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

(I was the one who placed that previous question.) That's exactly what I thought. Jesus doesn't belong on a list of people who "condemned usury". Any claim to interpret his words to mean such would clearly be original research. That he opposed usury is not sufficient reason to put him in that section, though again, it's doubtful he even opposed it. MrVoluntarist 15:04, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

The parable of the talents does NOT justify moneylending at interest. In the parable, the master (who may or may not be Jesus) rebuked the evil servant for not making use of the money in trying to invest it to get more, and he said that it would have been better to put it with the moneylenders at interest. This is a comparison, not a value judgement on the appropriateness of moneylenders. Clearly, if the master wanted to deposit the money with the moneylenders, he could have done so himself with less risk than going through the servant whom he knew was evil (this particular servant was only given 1, not 2 or 5 talents to invest while the master was away). To understand the comparison, the comparison only makes sense if the moneylenders ARE evil. For example, if I tell my girlfriend that she is no better than a harlot, because she slept with someone, that does not mean that I'm saying that harlotry is ok. Likewise, the master is not saying that moneylending at interest is ok.Jason Hommel 09:18, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Ah, almost missed this. Thanks for responding. I think this confirms what I said though, I don't think your example is analagous. Jesus is saying, "it was stupid to bury your money instead of lending it out at interest!" That's at least an implicit endorsement of interest. Jesus wouldn't have mentioned something he thought was evil as a "better use of time". For example, imagine him saying, "Why did you mope around all day when you could have been raping women?" MrVoluntarist 14:04, 17 August 2006 (UTC)

But Jesus did say this in Matthew 21:31 "...Verily I say unto you, That the publicans and the harlots go into the kingdom of God before you." Now, there are many different Christian groups in the world, and many different beliefs, but I don't know of a single Chrisitian group in the world that would twist this verse into saying that harlots are destined for the kingdom of God, and that this verse proves that harlotry is now ok. Why not? Because harlotry you can easily see with your mind, is wrong, (unlike usury which people typically think is ok) and you recognize the literary comparison here regarding harlotry is being used to showcase the utter evil of the people that Jesus is condemning in Matthew 21:31. Likewise, in the parable of the talents, the comparison must be to something very bad, to showcase how much worse the evil servant actually was. It would make no sense to say, "you should have at least invested in that stock that went up ten fold.", because that's not the least that could have been done. The language is not a tacit approval of banking at all, the language shows that banking is very, very, very bad, among the very worst of all possible investment choices that could have been chosen, except that what the evil servant did (specifically tried to not make money) was worse. In other words, banking is the LEAST next best thing that could have been done, and you are ignoring the entire point that the master could have deposited his money with the bankers in the first place, and he didn't! At the very least, this is a debatable point, and not a conclusive point that you are making, that Jesus thinks that usury is ok, because there is not a single other verse where Jesus says usury is ok, and in other places, Luke 6, Jesus says to not lend at interest. And at the most, I've conclusively proved you wrong on this point, that Jesus did not endorse usury at all, no more than he endorsed harlotry. Furthermore, it is no place to put your personal opinion of what Jesus taught about usury in the encyclopedia. A mere listing of Bible quotes should be fine, and then, if you want to add in discussion points below that section, ok. Jason Hommel 19:36, 17 August 2006 (UTC)

In answer to the original query: Yes, there are New Testament references where Jesus condemned usury; Luke 6:35 reports him saying " lend, expecting nothing in return ".( English Standard Version) while Matthew 5 : 16 etc says Jesus did not come to abolish the Law but to fulfil it, which has to include what the Old Testament has to say on the subject[[62.6.139.11 15:35, 27 September 2006 (UTC)]]

Late in the day I discover this Talk thread, having just made a page edit. I'd wecome comments on that Edit.

Additionally, I've just posted the following relevant comment at the Talk page for Capitalism:

"I suggest that re-ordering of this page is appropriate:

Finance capitalism is both a tautology and (as Finance - the use of money for profit in the forms of rent, interest, dividends and unequal pay for work) forms the action element of capitalism (the pre-conditional element - ownership of property or theft from and of the commonweal depending upon the mode of analysis - preceding the action elements (each of which has their own history).

Since access to finance (money and its equivalents) is the precondition (under capitalism) for the 'owned/stolen' elements (land, banking rights, knowledge ownership rights and sanctioned variable paid work income rates), then the history of capitalism is probably co-extensive with the history of money.

You are conflating money and capital. Even non-capitalist countries such as Cuba and the former USSR had money. Finance capitalism is a useful way to note how finance is now (mis)using the ability to create money without actually risking or supplying capital. This has been an increasingly disturbing development since the deregulation of banking and finance began in the early 1980s, through the 1999 repeal of Glass-Steagal, up until today, with the outbreak of systemic financial instability. Concerning capitalism being co-extensive with the history of money: money existed many hundreds of years before a socio-economic structure recognizable as capitalism emerged. See, for example, John Kenneth Galbraith, Economics in Perspective: A Critical History, 1987.--TonyWikrent (talk) 22:01, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

In support of this, the Wikipedia entry under usury points to the pre-mediaeval existence of a capitalist element in largely feudalist societies (ie those where the ownership of land was the predominant source of power).

The pivotal changes seem to have come with the permission to charge interest on lent money: particularly the Act 'In restraint of usury' of Henry VIII in England in 1545 (see: a) 'In Restraint of Usury: the Lending of Money at Interest', Sir Harry Page, The Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accounts, London, 1985, b) the Bibliography therein, and c) especially 'The Idea of Usury: from Tribal Brotherhood to Universal Otherhood', Benjamin Nelson, 2nd Edition, University of Chicago Press, Chicago and London, 1949, enlarged 2nd edition, 1969.)

Accordingly, I suggest the inclusion of such a stater text as the above at the start of the article, and will wait a few days for responses before doing so.

John Courtneidge

I believe that the reason Jesus was outraged at the money changers was the money itself. Jews would have been changing Denarius's for temple money. What was on a Denarius? A big ole' image of Caesar, a false god. Jews were not supposed to have that money, much less be exchanging it outside the temple.

Jason Whatley —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.254.171.221 (talk) 17:19, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

"

Any comments?

Thanks

Bible Quotations

Bible quotations should always mention the version/edition of the Bible. Could the person who added them please make the correction?

The Matt. 5:16 use to support the idea that since Jesus came to fullfil the law, He has indeed supported the laws forbiding usury should be considered. That quotation refers to Jesus coming and doing things so that what prophesies about Him in the law book (Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deutronomy), and the books of Psalms would come true. This does not suggest that Jesus came to condone everything that was said in the laws. Adjei Poku (ghana) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.87.90.102 (talk) 14:04, 9 May 2008 (UTC)

I edited Luke 9:23 from the incorrect paraphrase to the actual NIV quote. The section on Luke could still use some work, I'm not sure of the original author's purpose here. Also, there is an open quote with no closing quote. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.223.76.93 (talk) 17:46, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

Jesus was against interest?

Okay, I finally went ahead an deleted Jesus from the list of people against usury. I don't know of any mention in the Bible where he speaks against it; instead he tells a parable in which he negatively portrays someone who *avoids* loaning money at interest. If the person who put that had in mind the time Jesus kicked the moneychangers from the temple, sorry, that doesn't cut it. Jesus was clearly against the *place* of the moneychanging, not moneychanging itself. I find it rather strange that someone put Jesus on the list without being able to include a quote in the giant Biblical reference set. So Jesus is off the list until someone can find a place where he says anything against usury. And no, the Catholic Church's teachings don't count. 24.162.140.213 01:04, 3 August 2005 (UTC)

Why do people continue to delete the following scripture as somehow not on topic?

Luke 6:35 But love your enemies, do good to them, and lend to them without expecting to get anything back. Then your reward will be great…

It clearly says, "without expecting to get anything back", which is the direct opposite of demanding a return more than you lent, which is the definition of usury.Jason Hommel 09:17, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

No citation on hand, and not sure how it would fit into the article, but the scholastic theologian Domingo de Soto argued that Luke 6:35 had nothing to do with lending money at interest, which later became the opinion of the Catholic Church. A.w.hogan 19:09, 25 January 2007 (UTC)

I ma sure Jesus does not want people to take interest because by faith, if christians lend with interest, God Himself will bless the person and willingly reward him/her. The problem I have is what about the banks who are not operating under any biblical considerations and yet giving loans to people; shouldn't they charge interest? and you say that is not good? What about those of us who put money in the bank and are expecting interest on it? [Bernard Adjei-Poku] —Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.87.90.102 (talk) 14:13, 9 May 2008 (UTC)

Bernard - when one puts money into a bank and receives interest, the amount of money increases. However, due to inflation, the value of the money decreases. So if the interest is close to inflation then I doubt it would count as usury. About the parable of the master and his servants, it is just that: a parable. Many have interpreted it to be an older parable which Jesus uses to allude to God's grace in the form of "money", the point being to take the grace given to you and make it greater. As with any parable, however, it is open to interpretation. I would recommend striking it from the page, especially considering the original Greek or Aramaic may have had certain subtleties or connotations lost in the translation or deliberately struck.

Definition completely wrong.

This article seems to paint usury and interest as synonyms when they are not. Usury means an exorbitantly high level of interest. The relationship is more along the lines of the one between "fat" and "obese".

Also while usury comes from usus it is not a direct descendant. Its Latin counterpart is in fact "usuria" which means interestingly enough "lending at exorbitant interest". It descends from the word "usura" which means "a sum paid for using money" and it in turn is descended from "usus" meaning "use".

The whole article is distorted by this original misconception.

I haven't made any changes to the article mostly due to the fact that I would have to redo more than half of it, and I don't want to do that, and cause a edit war.

I agree that usury and interest are not exact synonyms; if anything usury is broader, however. Theological sources and in many cases socialists refer to any kind of "overcharging" or "unfair charging" as usury. (For example, the Islamic equivalent, riba, includes a boatman charging more to rescue a drowning victim than he normally charges to ferry people - nothing to do with interest - while it does not refer to a merchant giving discounts to people who pay upfront rather than in installments - which is a form of interest.) However, it is the case that interest of any kind has historically been referenced as "usury", and only later did the meaning change to "exorbitantly high interest". The article already reflects this shift.

The part about decending from "usus" is there, not because it's the "truth" but because that's what etymologists say it comes from. If you can find a source specifically making the connection you claim, cite it and make the change. Otherwise it's original research. MrVoluntarist 20:16, 28 August 2005 (UTC)

I found this link that supports it and I originally got the information from Google's Dictionary page on usury here

Alright, go ahead and edit the etymology. As for that answers.com page, it just repeats what's in the Wikipedia article and supports the definition it gives. MrVoluntarist 22:43, 28 August 2005 (UTC)

No. It is impossible to define "usury" as "excesive" interest. Because that just pushes the definition further away in to trying to define what "excessive" is. Usury is defined for us already in the Biblical scriptures as ANY increase.

Citations a bit skewed/out of context

I was reading an article making the case that interest on loans is legitimate according to the bible on loans not meant for charity - commercial loans (http://www.reformed-theology.org/ice/newslet/bet/bet98.04.htm). Citing Leviticus 25:35-37 instead of just 36 and 37 gives much more credence to this view. Also, I think it can be a bit misleading to make a (somewhat false) segmentation between verses right next to each other.

Economic argument

I have texts with any particular detail on point, so I cannot make a concise summary for the economics section of the article, but I think the article should mention the core economic logic underlying savings and investment, and hence the interest rate. The reasons for saving and investment, the tradeoff between future and present consumption, the compensation for such/price of money, time value of money and so on.

Weasel words and POV in the "scholastic theology" section

The "scholastic theology" section of this article goes off on a long anti-capitalist rant, contrary to the neutral POV policy, which is qualified by the weasel words "For many." The other side of the argument in favor of charging interest on loans -- i.e., that it provides compensation to the lender for the risk that the borrower will default on the loan -- is completely overlooked in this section.

REPLY - I do not find a "a long anti-capitalist rant" as alleged in the paragraph above. Methinks thou doth protest too much. I am detecting more and more edgy defensiveness as Wall Street and corporatism come increasingly under attack as the financial and economic crises which began in August 2007 deepen. Note that the person who wrote the paragraph above next presents the classic neo-liberal argument for banking and charging interest as "the other side of the argument." The other side of what argument? The article is on usury, not on banking and charging interest.

The plain fact is that there was a tremendous amount of thinking done by theologians in the 1400s to 1600s on the question of usury, and that should be noted here. And the biblical references to usury and, ahem, charging interest, are definitely germane and extremely useful to have immediately at hand. It is what makes Wikipedia so useful and valuable. There are apparently people who are getting increasingly nervous now with growing awareness by both elites and the public in general that neo-liberal economic nostrums such as the "free market" are failing to achieve the greatest social welfare as promised. - END of REPLY —Preceding unsigned comment added by TonyWikrent (talk • contribs) 21:41, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

Ethical Arguments

I changed the wording of "arguments for and against" to read simply "arguments for", because the censors have deleted all the arguments against usury. Go ahead, and keep your one sided biased article, and keep the truth buried. DAMN CENSORS! -end-

Please, religious people and students of the Arts, as much as you might feel that simplistic systems of ethics are applicable to international debt markets, that thousand-year-old religious scriptures are of aid in the modern global economy, or that the arguments against usury are valid (they are not; you do not sufficiently understand economic theory), do not state your viewpoint as to the supposed supremacy of anachronistic Islamic analyses in the article. Provide the arguments for and against and allow the reader to make a decision, laughable as the mere reference of Medieval writers in consideration of modern debt markets is.

Suggesting that interest repayments leads to "legal force" which infers that interest itself is a source of "violence" and "government failure" is very biased. Sounds like religious dogma to me. Acssm 20:06, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

I think I've handled the bias in that section, so I removed the tag and added an original research warning requesting source for the arguments. MrVoluntarist 15:22, 1 June 2006 (UTC)

I'm not an Islamicist, but a Chrisitan, and an extremely successful student of the capital markets, as I make millions by investing. It is axiomatic that any contract that requires a future obligation of any kind does require enforcement, or the use of force, to secure compliance in the event of willful refusal of compliance, or non-payment. This is not bias, this is reality. This is why people enter into contracts, and why there are court systems in the first place. Thus, usury contracts can be legitamately said to be a source of violence, as they require enforcement for non-payment, reposession, and government force to enforce them.

Sorry, there are plenty of unsecured loans in the United States and elsewhere, and the credit system makes people try like mad to avoid declaring bankruptcy, since it will prevent them from getting future loans, apartment rentals, etc. Certainly, some people sign away their property, conditional on loan non-payment, and, attempting to reneg on this transfer after default, force must be used. But then, in both cases, force is used to defend property and enforce it. So, that statement is either false or useless. Unless we want to preface every article with the claim "oh by the way, property depends on force", we can't include this bit about "usury can be abolished merely by not recognizing it in law". MrVoluntarist 17:52, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Lending money at interest is ethical if we can establish that such a system denies no one in a community of borrowers the ability to repay his debt in full. Since the monetary systems of most countries of the world are based on interest-bearing debt, it is worthwhile to illustrate the ethical challenge of such systems with a simple example.

Let's consider a small group of 10 people each of whose products and services contribute to the gross domestic product of their community. They are used to exchanging products and services with each other through barter, but recognize its limitations. One day a man comes into town and observes the group making their trades. He announces to them that he can supply money, which will make trade easier for everyone.

On December 1st, the lender offers each member of the community $1,000 in paper money he produced with a sophisticated printing press. Excited at the idea of easy trade, each of the 10 signs a loan agreement stating that in exchange for the $1,000 he promises to pay $86 per month for 12 months (5.85% APR). The first payment is due January 1st and subsequent payments are likewise due on the 1st of each subsequent month. The lender also requires each borrower to declare an asset, e.g., a car, machinery, piece of real property, or other property as security for his loan. Since each member of the community considers himself honest and hardworking, he is sure of his personal ability to pay off the loan and, therefore, agrees to the terms.

December trade goes well with the $10,000 (10 x $1,000) of new money in circulation. But by mid-June, having paid more than half the initial sum in circulation to the lender, the the borrowers notice that money is getting scarce. So they begin bartering their goods and services again to make up for the lack of currency.

Now assume community members conduct fairly even trade during the year, none are savers, and the lender doesn't spend back into the community any loan payments he receives. In the worst case, On December 1st, at least 4 of the 10 borrowers will be unable to make their final payments, which permits the lender to seize assets they declared as collateral on their loan agreements. In the best case, only one of the borrowers will "mismanage" his money, defaulting on his loan in September. If anyone in the community saves money during the year, the resulting decrease in circulating money forces others to default on their loans earlier.

Let's look at it from the lender's perspective. On December 1st, he prints $10,000 in crisp bills and divides it equally ($1,000) among 10 people. He receives $86 x 10 = $860 each month, $26.67 of which is interest. By November, total payments to the lender are $9,460 with only $540 left in circulation. On December 1st, if everyone were able to pay his debt in full, total payments to the lender would be $10,320.

But the lender made only $10,000 available to the community. The community members have no way of producing the additional $320 the lender requires as interest on their loans. Only the lender can supply the additional money and he will only supply it if the borrower agrees to pay (additional) interest. The lender knows that charging interest empirically forces repossessions, foreclosures, and bankruptcies in a significant portion of the borrowing population.

Is it ethical, then, for a country to enforce law that divides the population into an elite lending class who regularly force a large number of the massive borrowing class into poverty? Would disclosing the true nature of the lending business to the borrowing class make it any more ethical? —Preceding unsigned comment added 21:43, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

Changes in "historical" sections

I moved around the text in the "historical" section in an attempt to make the idea flow a bit better. I also rewrote the section on traditional Jewish law. There were grammatical errors and had several half baked ideas in one paragraph. I tried to distill the salient point of the entire paragraph, but also deleted the bulk of offshoots about discrimination against Jews because I felt it detracted from the main issue: ursury and its historical meaning

I had read some of the talk comments concerning the meaning of ursury and attempted to hedge the concept by describing it as excessive interest but also came to be used as a term describing "unfair" money-lending practices.

71.32.51.201 07:47, 4 June 2006 (UTC)new to wiki

Usury as Slavery

..the borrower is the slave of the lender. --Proverbs 22:7 (English Standard Version) ...and the borrower becomes the lender's slave. --Proverbs 22:7 (New American Standard Bible) ...those who borrow are slaves of moneylenders. --Proverbs 22:7 (Contemporary English Version) It can be calculated that if you invested an ounce of gold at 1/4 of 1% interest rate, 6000 years ago, it would grow to about 6 billion ounces. But the best estimates are that there is less than 5 billion ounces of gold in the world from all gold mining in the history of the world. Therefore, since it is impossible to pay back more than exists, the practice of usury creates the condition of perpetual slavery for borrowers. For example, the United States had a debt of $250 billion at the end of world war II. At the time, with gold at $35/oz., that amounted to 7.1 billion ounces of gold. True to form, tax rates in the U.S. range from 30% to over 50%. Historically, serfs paid 30% of income to their masters, and slaves paid 50%.

This section was added by an anon user. I think it would be better if it was sourced, since it looks like original research at the moment. MrArt 03:16, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

I registered and added sources. Thank you.Jason Hommel 06:18, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Hi, and thanks for registering. Your source says servant, not slave. To include the rest of the paragraph, you need to quote a reputable source that makes the argument. Otherwise it is definitely original research --MrArt 23:32, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Should that be removed for now then? I tried to even it out, but maybe it just shouldn't be there. MrVoluntarist 23:41, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Personally I would get rid of the whole section, but let's wait and see what Mr Hommel has to say. --MrArt 23:49, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Actually, I'm not going to wait -- he didn't even bother to do the math properly. At 0.25 percent pa interest, 6000 years would mean about 3 million, not 6 billion ounces. MrVoluntarist 00:12, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

Thank you for asking for sources, and then asking about the sources. Servant and slave are synonymous, as other translations note, as I have now noted. The source of interest calculation is actually a bad calculator, one I found quickly, in response to the demand for a source. My actual source was Microsoft Excel. But I suppose the real problem here is that I am making an argument, and not citing a source of the argument, and thus I'm pushing a Point of View. On the other hand, the topic is Usury, a Biblical word and topic, and I'm quoting a Biblical scripture on topic that helps to explain why usury is wrong (even though the scripture quoted, Proverbs 22:7, does not use the word "usury". Further, I'm explaining, through math, why Proverbs 22:7 is correct in noting that borrowers can be described as slaves of the moneylenders. I thought that was the point here, in listing criticisms to usury. As it stands, none of the other arguments against usury even list any sources at all, and in this argument, I listed several. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Jason Hommel (talk • contribs) 11:15, 16 August 2006 (UTC)

Hmm, this getting very interesting! Nowadays, slavery is universally condemned. But I'm not sure that when the Bible was written, it had quite the same bad connotations. At least, the Bible does not seem to condemn it (according to this web site, though of course it may be a biased site. I'm sure you know more than me!) I think your quote would be better in the 'Injunctions against usury within religious texts' section. You are right about the other arguments not having sources, perhaps we can work together to add some? MrArt 13:06, 16 August 2006 (UTC)

The original Mosaic Code meliorates slavery but does not eliminate it. Consider it a stepping stone to begin to cross a river of pain and oppression.

Jason, your argument about exponential financial growth equalling slavery is original research or needs to be sourced. Not the math; not the debt figures; the actual claim that "being able to make that much money through this method is tantamount to slavery". Who argued that? Plus, I corrected the math part, though I'm not sure what it now proves. MrVoluntarist 14:10, 16 August 2006 (UTC)

You are right, in that each point I'm making may be able to be backed up, I'm making an argument. Instead, I listed Nehemiah, in which both the people being oppressed by usury call it slavery, and Nehemiah also likens it to slavery. This way, I'm not presenting original research. Jason Hommel 19:03, 16 August 2006 (UTC)

Cool. However, now that entire section is just biblical citations (not present Christian/Jewish theorists who have long since dropped the opposition to interest), so it should probably be a subheading under the "biblical injunctions against usury". That is, it should list the current quotes and then say "Characterization as slavery" and then list the slavery-related ones you added. I would do the same for the "Islam" part in "ethical arguments against usury", but that does refer to modern theorists. MrVoluntarist 19:07, 16 August 2006 (UTC)

Very good suggestion. Thank you for recognizing and pointing out the proper category for this section. Jason Hommel 01:25, 17 August 2006 (UTC)

The New Testament and the Old Testament are collections of books which explain and illustrate the issue of usury in its oldest meaning, which is both the extraction of interest and the extraction of excessive interest (the modern meaning of usury). Interest and usury are forms of slavery, yet more vicious forms of slavery existed throughout the Bronze Age, through the modern age. Jesus the Nasaraean opposed usury while acknowledging the practice existed. Christian theorists who debate whether the bronze age Law of Moses is acceptable legal code cite different New Testament books to argue the relevance or irrelevance of the Mosaic Code, and show that particular books support or defend slavery versus abolition of slavery in its various forms, even within the same book. As a comparison, the Bible has exhortations in some books to drink wine, yet warnings against imbibing in other passages.

There are significant distinctions between current theorists, and the areas of their current disagreement. Each usually explains the status quo, in an attempt to establish a common theoretical foundation, then argues for changes either to that foundation or on other significant issues. The best current scholarship seems to me to be based on whether the Law of Moses and the prophets is still the Word of God, an argument that has been ongoing among Christians since the time of John the Baptist. Abolition theorists of the "War of the Bibles" at the time of the U.S. Civil War led to rights of citizenship for emancipated slaves. Bond slavery continues, and so does abolitionist sentiment. Thinkers concerned about the morality of interest, usury and other forms of legal and illegal human bondage, from all the various religions and philosophies, explain their opposition with various arguments.

My main concern is that you discount the meme that Jesus presented, "Love your enemies," and the implications of his actions and words. For example, at Luke 16:14, "The Pharisees, who were money lovers, were listening to all these things, and they began to sneer at him." They understood Jesus was attacking their legalized usury. Responding, Jesus declares the end of the Law of Moses and the Prophets on which they premised their actions. But the next paragraph appears to perpetuate the Law forever. The obvious circumstance is that there was some later editing of the text. So biblical scholars research to evaluate Jesus sayings. The current vogue when examining the words of Jesus is to consider the evaluations of the Jesus Seminar 1993 [[1]]. Words are colour-coded -- RED: Jesus really said it; PINK: Jesus might have said something like it; GREY: Jesus didn't say it but it's the sort of thing he would have said; BLACK: Jesus didn't say it nor would he ever say such a thing. Interestingly, sentences regarding the end of the Law of Moses are considered more genuine than attributions regarding the continuation of the Law of Moses (and its laws regarding slavery and lending), yet both positions are considered unlikely to be authentic words of Jesus, instead being derivations by factions of his disciples.

Regardless of whether Jesus actually spoke similar words, a common error is to disarticulate the "parable of the talents" into figurative and literal components. Jesus is attributed to have used metaphor to illustrate his concern that those who gain wealth through usury have a difficult time acquiring the kingdom of heaven. If Jesus parable (parabolic teaching) was clearly speaking figuratively, then talents (money) represent the resources of person belonging to God. So giving one's talents to moneylenders is also figurative, not literal. The moneylenders represent people not belonging to God. The focus of Jesus parable is that godly people sin when they do not attempt to do good works. Giving the money to lenders would be the absolute worse choice, i.e. allowing ungodly people to use one's own resources, yet even that would be better than no action at all. To view the parable as endorsing usury is fallacious.

Place Jesus back on the list of religious authorities opposed to usury, because he considered it antithetical to holiness.98.224.223.229 20:37, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

NLT rather than KJV?

Is there a reason that the bibilical text here is in NLT rather than the public domain KJV? Borisblue 04:46, 17 August 2006 (UTC)

For the Hebrew Bible, I found the translations to be inaccurate and tendentious. I changed to classic JPS1917 and added a link to ORT translation with Rashi commentary. ←Humus sapiens ^ну? 11:24, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

Comment on Biblical Quote

From this Section;

Moreover, in the non-canonical Gospel of Thomas, Jesus is more explicit:

"If you have money, don't lend it at interest. Rather, give [it] to someone from whom you won't get it back." (Saying 95)

Here, Jesus is made to go farther than He actually did: He asks us to lend and hope not for gain or increase. We are entitled to receive what is ours back again, but even then, not to cause the debtor to be thrown into destitution.

Doesn't make much sense to me, what does it mean by 'was made to go farther than He actually did'? It seems like someones personal interpretation rather than a legitimate & objective statement. Number36 21:51, 17 December 2006 (UTC)

28.120.24|172.128.120.24]] 18:43, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

I agree that this addition is a commentary/POV on the Saying recorded in 'Thomas', and, should be deleted.

I've also added book references.

John courtneidge 03:46, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

Okay I've deleted it, glad it wasn't just me.

I also think a 'citation needed' should be added to the earlier parts of the new testament section, especially when it makes claims about what they were understood to mean until modern times, it begs the question of who it was that understood to mean it that way and who it is that is interpreting it the other way in modern times? (And also what it means by 'modern times' which is a bit ambiguous). And while both interpretations seem to be valid, it seems to me that it presents the latter, and what it asserts to be the more 'modern', is the more accurate. Perhaps it would be better to reorganise the entire section to simply present the relevant quotes, but I think pointing out that the wording can be taken either way is valuable for the article, just that perhaps the way it is now worded isn't the best way of doing it. Number36 05:17, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

Odd appearance of references

"Usury and the law" has the following:

Congress has opted to put a federal criminal limit on interest rates by the RICO definitions of "unlawful debt" which make it a federal felony to lend money at an interest rate more than two times the local state usury rate and then try to collect that "unlawful debt"- Source 18 USCA 1961 B(6)(B).

(my highlighting) and "Usury rates in the US" has:

And in some states (as New York) such loans are voided, meaning made void from the beginning or ab initio. Ref NY Gen Oblig 5-501 et seq. and NY 1503.

References are great, but wouldn't it be better to cite these so they appear correctly in the reference section? Without knowing what these documents actually are, I'm not willing to try to cite them properly myself.

Jarich 11:26, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

"Simple English" article

Could someone, with a better understanding than I, make a SE version of this article?

Islam % limit

I heard that Islam, or a sect of Islam may perhaps actually allow lending, but with a capped limit of something like 2.5%. May need investigating.

80.229.47.244 10:34, 23 June 2007 (UTC)jago25

You heard wrong. Interest on money or anything that can be used as money (ex. gold) is forbidden (the profit jewellers make is on the workmanship not the gold itself). Most Muslim scholars even say that taking a loan and paying the interst is forbidden not only recieving it. This is for both sunni and shia muslims.

2.5% is the general amount of zakat (Islamic tax) to be paied by the rich to the poor. --Maha Odeh 09:13, 1 July 2007 (UTC)

Formal definition

I think the definition in the article needs to be reviewed, in other online encyclopedias (e.g. Merriam Webster Usury is defined as;

1. the lending of money with an interest charge for its use; especially : the lending of money at exorbitant interest rates
2. an unconscionable or exorbitant rate or amount of interest; specifically : interest in excess of a legal rate charged to a borrower for the use of money

There are clearly two meanings, as a synonym for interest, and the practice of charging excessive interest. Page 84 of Human Ecology Vol 1 (Thomas Robertson 1977 reprint of the 1948 publication) has a good overview of the definition and questions the subjectivity around what actually is lending at an excessive interest rate. This article clearly slants towards the second definition.

There is also no information on Major vs Minor Usury. --Zven (talk) 20:01, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

As far as edits to the lead section, this sounds like a good start to me. The current lead section has no references, your definition does; so if you ask me, that means you win. However, for the main body of the article, note that sometimes articles purposefully do not deal with every aspect of the word itself. Instead, the word refers to a specific encylopedic topic; in which case some other article named by some synonym covers other meanings. In these cases, there are templates that can be used to explain the scope of each article. In this case, the first definition can be covered by articles such as Credit (finance), Interest, Moneylender, or other article. I'm not certain what if any organization exists here as I'm not intimately familiar with any of these articles. -Verdatum (talk) 17:05, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

Tag Maintenance

rm (cleanup tag removed by Washburnmav (talk) 19:22, 14 August 2008 (UTC)) because overall article is in fact at wiki overall quality level without quibbling about the defintion of the latter. Needs some minor structural adjustments and placement in context which I will attempt (next talk §).

rm

from Hebrew Bible/Old Testament because it's not, it's just quoted material from the named source.

rm

from Ethical arguments for and against usury because there are now notes.

as far as the remaining tag on the New Testament §, a little formatting, not as much as in Riba would be consistent with overall article and previous §;at the other extreme a subsection breakout by Christian denomination could be given.

Lycurgus (talk) 11:47, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

Structural Maintenance

Basically just organized and put existing content in context, no other substantive changes other than that noted in § above. No content was removed or altered up to this action, just put in context. 74.78.162.229 (talk) 12:27, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

USA, etc.

Changed "rate" to "statute" (since that is what the section is actually about), other minor clean-up. Also put in context with other wiki articles, etc, (see edit comments). 74.78.162.229 (talk) 14:08, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

Completed cleanup as in edit log, marshalling of content in this page. 74.78.162.229 (talk) 12:35, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

Confusing / Contradictory paragraph

This paragraph(shown in part below) contradicts itself, and could also do with citing a reference to the word 'Marranos':

...In 1290, all Jews were expelled from England...however, not all Jews were expelled, word for this conversion was called "Marranos" ... There is no link to 'Marranos' , but when I looked it up on Wikipedia, it seems actually the term is specific to 'secret' Iberian Jews - was this use of the Spanish word really contemporary to England also ?

The phrase 'it was easy to convert to Christianity...' could probably do with citing a reference or two as well. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Monowiki (talk • contribs) 20:56, 1 September 2008 (UTC)

Dubious source with possibly incorrect information

I have tagged the sentence:

In 1980, due to inflation, national banks (banks that generally include N.A. in their name), federally chartered savings banks, installment plan sellers and chartered loan companies were exempted from state usury limits by the federal government through a special law. This effectively overrode all state and local usury laws.

as coming from an unreliable source because the source itself, the 'Lectric Law Library, states at the top of the page: "This info is always changing so confirm anything before relying on it." That alone fails WP:RS.

More importantly, I don't think it's accurate. The closest thing to a "special law" I can think of that brought that result wasn't anything passed by Congress but the Supreme Court's Marquette Nat. Bank of Minneapolis v. First of Omaha Service Corp. decision, which held unanimously that the National Banking Act of 1863 allowed national banks to charge a rate of interest legal in the state they were chartered in, regardless of where the borrower lived.

I am adding this to the article, removing this "special law" thing, and leaving this message here in case anyone can explain this better and cite a reliable source to that effect. Daniel Case (talk) 20:26, 6 September 2008 (UTC)