ربا
Ribā
Usury: gain taken from a loan at the borrower’s expense, which the Quran forbids.
What it means
The Quran says that God has permitted trade and forbidden ribā (2:275), and warns of a war from God against those who continue it (2:278–279). It adds that if the debtor is in difficulty, there should be time for him, and that to forgive the debt is better (2:280). A hadith in Sahih Muslim says the Prophet cursed the one who takes it, the one who gives it, the one who records it and the two who witness it.
Muslims have developed finance on other principles, such as profit-sharing, sale at an agreed mark-up and leasing.
Often misunderstood as
That Islam is simply against business.
What the sources say
The same teaching is found in the other scriptures: the Torah forbids charging interest to the poor (Exodus 22:25), and the medieval Church banned usury for centuries. Islam is a religion in which trade is praised, and the Prophet was himself a merchant. The prohibition is aimed at gain from the weakness of a debtor, and not at commerce.
Term and Arabic as listed in Ismail al Faruqi, Toward Islamic English (International Institute of Islamic Thought, 1995), p. 32, listed as RIBĀ. The definition is restated here.