At the beginning of this 21st century, through immigration and increased wealth in the Middle and Near East, the then not yet officially troubled western economies came to be more acquainted to the differences practiced by traditional banks from the Islamic world. The most exquisite aspect western investours identified and are still struggling with in Islamic banking and finance, is the avoidance of charging interest.
As far I understand Sharia law basically looks to allow a return on the provision of monies over time only if there is an investment / ownership participation in property but by no means would the outright surrendering of money allow additional money to be earned off the borrower, i.e. the charging of interest.
The Jewish society for long has had similar prohibitions with the particular difference that the Tanakh does allow interest charges but only to non-Jews.
In Europe, throughout most of the centuries where there was a significant rule of the Roman Catholic church, the doctrine on interest charges is less black and white but both opponents and supporters of interest earnings appear to agree that the collection of interest is generally associated to certain degrees of exploitation, abuse and a thus a cause of conflict between rich and poor.
Traditionally the christian logic should be that the return for the provision of a loan to those in need would simply be repaid in gratitude. Within the same line of thinking, the desire of lenders to claim interest would generally be perceived as immoral, unproductive, almost lazy.
This however was Europe in the middle ages. Today, those who are in need of borrowing are seen by some material lenders as the immoral and unproductive lazy ones.
I guess it all comes down to the true intentions of the borrower.
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