Discussion on installment sales and that the increase therein is usury or interest.

The Shaykh : It is a sale with two prices: the cash sale, which they call "cash" here, and the installment sale. The scholars have two opinions regarding this transaction: some permit taking an increase in exchange for the debt, while others prohibit it, and each has a perspective. However, Allah the Mighty and Majestic says: So when we referred the matter to what came in the Sunnah, which clarifies the Noble Qur'an, which says: This verse contains an explicit mention of the permissibility of one thing, which is selling, and the prohibition of another, which is usury or interest. But is every sale permissible according to what came in this verse , or are there restrictions and conditions that must be adhered to so that the sale mentioned in the verse is as it came in the verse ? The answer, by the consensus of the scholars of the Muslims, is that not every sale is permissible and falls under the generality of the verse. Rather, it is the sale that the Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him) specified in his hadiths as a permissible sale that is what Allah the Mighty and Majestic intended in this verse. As for the other sales that the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him and his family) prohibited, they do not fall under the verse. For example: a type of deception, as you know. Perhaps you know the occasion of this hadith so that you may understand the jurisprudence of this hadith and its importance. That is that the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him and his family) entered the market one day and found a man who had piled up a heap of wheat in front of him for sale. He reached his hand in, and lo, the inside of the heap was wet and damp, while its outside was dry. He said to him: He said, "O Messenger of Allah, the sky touched it," meaning the rain. He said: So this sale is not permissible. He is selling, but it is not permissible because it involves deception. Its outside is dry, but it is wet. He weighs it with a heavy weight, as is known of this kind. Now, the sale of bread while the steam is still rising from it is deception. But there is supervision, they claim. But a name without a body has no reality for this supervision. And so much bread is sold as dough on top of dough, meaning it is not originally well-baked or well-kneaded, and on top of that, as they say, "a straw on a camel's back." They throw it on top of each other, it becomes more kneaded, and they also sell it while it is hot instead of letting it cool. In conclusion, not every sale falls under the generality of the saying of the Exalted: As for usury or interest, everything that the Messenger (peace be upon him) called usury or interest is usury or interest. So listen now to his saying (may the prayer and peace of Allah be upon him) regarding the topic of installment sales. There are two hadiths: one is narrated by Imam Ahmad in his Musnad with his strong chain from Abdullah ibn Mas'ud, and through one of the Tabi'un, whose name is Sammak ibn Harb, from Ibn Mas'ud, who said: Unfortunately, the meaning of such a prohibition is not known at all today, and there is no wonder in that, because when Sammak ibn Harb narrated this hadith, he also found this text strange. So a questioner asked, "What are two sales in one sale?" And the narrator of the hadith answered, "That you say, 'I will sell you this for such-and-such cash, and for such-and-such on credit.'" That is, I will sell you this for one hundred cash and one hundred and ten on credit, more or less, it does not matter. The important thing is that there are two prices: the cash price and the installment price. The cash price is less, and the installment price is more. So Abdullah ibn Mas'ud, the noble Companion, narrates to us from our Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him and his family) that he prohibited two sales in one sale, meaning he prohibited selling on installments for a price higher than the cash sale. Now, the merchants today, except for those whom Allah protects, and they are few, and I cannot say that they are nonexistent, but perhaps they are a very, very small minority who sell the installment price at the cash price. But after them, they may sell at one price, but they sell the cash price at the installment price, meaning they increase in the cash sale and raise the cash price to the level of the installment price. So, as we said in some gatherings, the merchant Zayd, for example, was oppressing half of his customers, namely those who buy on installments. When he heard that making two prices for one item is prohibited in the hadith, he raised the cash price as well, so he oppressed all the customers, whereas before he was only oppressing those who bought only by the installment method. This is one hadith. And there is a second hadith, which is more explicit on the topic. He (may the prayer and peace of Allah be upon him) said: meaning the one with the lower price. This hadith has many benefits, among which is that this hadith gives us, legally, that the sale is concluded, but it is forbidden for the seller to take the installment price, and he must take the cash price. For example, if it is a device, a refrigerator, a registered car, etc., he sells it for two prices and takes the installment price in stages, in installments, as is known. It is not permissible for him to take an increase over the installment sale. This increase is usury or interest. If we know this reality, now this ruling came explicitly in these two hadiths. But some of the scholars in the past did not have all the hadiths reach them, because the hadiths were collected over the years. And this has a detail that I summarize in one word: The Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him), as we know, was in Madinah, and not all the Companions were present when he spoke; rather, some were present and most were absent. Then he used to travel and move around. So in every gathering he spoke in, Abu Bakr might be present but Umar absent, or the reverse. And so the hadiths of the Messenger (peace be upon him), by virtue of this reality, were scattered among the Companions, and no single Companion encompassed them all. This is impossible. Then these Companions were scattered in the lands in the time of the Messenger, in Makkah, in Ta'if, etc. And after his death, due to their expansion in the Islamic conquests, they expanded more and more, and scattered more and more. So the Sunnah was scattered by the scattering of the Companions in the lands due to the Islamic conquests. Those who met the Companions are said of them what is said of the Companions: some of them met so-and-so and so-and-so of the Companions and heard from them what they had of hadiths, and missed what the others had, and vice versa.