What is your opinion regarding the claim that we, who are in industrial and commercial professions, are exposed to many matters, and if we follow the Shari'ah rulings and the details we hear from the scholars, we will reach a point where we cannot work at all?

The questioner : If you please, my Shaykh, the question I want to ask is completely different from the questions that have been raised. That is, our question is that we are in professions, we are in industrial and commercial professions, and we are exposed to many matters. If we follow the rulings and the details we hear from the scholars, it will come to a point where we cannot work at all.
For example, I work in the knitting profession. The knitting profession requires images; we put drawings on children's clothes. If we display our goods without these images, there is no buyer for them, or if there is a buyer, it will be very few, and the prices would have to be low. If we follow the images, there will be sales for us and the situation will be excellent on this side.
The second aspect relates to practical matters. If I want to import thread, I need a large capital to import the thread so that I can produce and sell. If I buy it from the merchant here, it costs me one thousand dinars per ton. If I buy it from the merchant in Oman, it saves me one thousand dinars per ton. That means, in a year, it saves me 20,000 dinars. If I take the amount and buy through any bank, I have to pay about 7 percent. So instead of the 20,000, I pay about 5,000 and save 15,000 dinars a year. This is from the side of the knitting profession.
We have brothers, the goldsmiths, owners of goldsmith factories, who asked us to ask you this question: If we deal hand-to-hand and like-for-like, this is correct, but we cannot do it. Because I go to the gold merchant and say to him, send me three kilos of gold. How am I going to pay him? I have to pay him after a period, giving him deferred checks, because I cannot have every amount available with me so that I can take the amount, make it into jewelry, and sell it. This makes a difference for me. If I enter into riba (usury or interest) and leave the profession, I cannot find a second profession. We have other brothers who work in many matters.

Another questioner : Your question...

The Shaykh : Continue your lecture.

The questioner : Do you see how we have brothers? I am telling you, I work by renting chairs for weddings and funerals and equipment for weddings. Now, this wedding will have munkar (what is wrong) in it; this wedding will be mixed. So if I give up these things, what am I going to work in?
Our other brothers who work in the supermarket tell you, if I do not sell tobacco, there is no profit at all in tobacco, but tobacco brings other sales. So if I, you, and that person stay away from these matters, what is the alternative for us?

The Shaykh : ... Professor, and I think the rest of the attendees with us, that in your question there are many questions.

The questioner: Yes.

The Shaykh : Even if the respondent were a young, alert person, it would be very difficult for him to memorize these questions grouped in one question. Therefore, I see that my answer to all your questions should first be a general answer, and then the answer should be detailed after you ask your questions one by one.
I say: These questions, without offense, do not come from a Muslim who truly believes in Allah and His Messenger, especially since he believes in what has become common in this age of hanging some noble verses on walls and decorating these walls with these verses instead of decorating our hearts with those verses, namely the verse that says: . I think that if I directed the following question to any Muslim who has a little knowledge and fear of the Majestic Allah, asking: Do you think of Allah a bad thought, such that if you feared Allah (Mighty and Majestic) and avoided what Allah has forbidden you from means and causes that you engage in, whether with non-Muslims or with Muslims who do not prohibit or permit, if we directed the following question: Do you think of Allah a bad thought that if you feared Allah (Mighty and Majestic) in the cause by which you seek your provision, He will not make the way of provision easy for you? I think the answer will be unanimous and without any disagreement: I do not think of Allah a bad thought, but I believe that the matter is as the Lord of the Worlds said: .
And I, on this occasion, mention two hadiths, because in my opinion they are like an explanation of the noble verse, and each of the hadiths is in the Sahih.
As for the first hadith, it is in "Sahih al-Bukhari," and both are from the hadith of Abu Hurayrah. Al-Bukhari narrates in his "Sahih" from Abu Hurayrah that he said: The Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) said: Do you think this will happen today? It requires bonds and bills of exchange, and I do not know the names, and Allah has not sent down authority for them. He expressed disapproval at the beginning, but reliance on Allah (Mighty and Majestic) in reality brings wonders of matters;
This, of course, is an action that does not enter into the cosmic causes first, nor is it within the Shari'ah causes second. But as the Sufis say, as you know, if a person is taken by the state (hal), he does not know what words or states will come out of him—Bismillah, Alhamdulillah—and Allah (Mighty and Majestic) is the All-Knowing of what is in the breasts and the Able to do everything. And because the man knew, as I mentioned earlier, that what he did was not a cosmic cause nor a Shari'ah cause, and there was no guarantee or guarantor that the thousand dinars would reach the creditor, he completely ignored what he did. Here the psychological clarity appears, and as it is said: "Birds fall according to their kind." Both the creditor and the debtor were of good hearts. So the man felt that he had a thousand dinars, a thousand dinars, by an unnatural way, and the other thousand dinars were for the repayment of the debt. So he could not do anything but tell him the story of the wood... He said: to the end. This is the first story in "Sahih al-Bukhari."