Rays of Wisdom for the Modern World
His Holiness, Hazrat Mirza Masroor Ahmad (aba) is a beaming beacon of Divine guidance and support. His Holiness (aba) represents the highest level of a connection with God in today’s world and thus he is the spiritual leader for tens of millions across the world, and champions the message of fulfilling the rights owed to God, and fulfilling the duties we each owe to our fellow human beings. Over the course of his Friday Sermons, addresses on various occasions, meetings with different organizations and children’s classes, His Holiness (aba) imparts invaluable knowledge and insight on a remarkably vast array of topics.
The Review of Religions is honoured to present some of these ‘Rays of Wisdom’ from His Holiness (aba) taken from various sources, for the benefit of its readers.
Is it Permissible to Buy Shares?
Much is made of the race to gain as much wealth as possible, whereas the reality is that this race initially started from the necessity of having enough wealth to provide for oneself and their family. Ultimately man’s greed kicked in, and now we find ourselves in a world where too much wealth is still not enough. In the midst of it all, the need for wealth to a degree of being able to survive and provide still exists. Many financial experts, especially the ones making motivational videos on social media, offer the advice that people should strive to have more than one source of income to ensure financial stability and security. A popular method which many adopt in order to accomplish this is buying stocks and shares. Once, someone asked His Holiness (aba) if it is permissible to buy shares.
His Holiness (aba) replied:
‘If you wish to buy shares in various companies, then there is no harm in doing so. You can buy shares through the stock exchange. However, if someone turns this into a business and starts buying and selling shares like gambling, they look to see if the market goes up, then they will sell their shares, or if the market goes down, then they will buy shares; if they remain calculating these things day and night, always watching the board to see how FTS shares or shares on the NASDAQ and other shares are faring, then this would be considered gambling, and one should refrain from doing so.
Otherwise, there are shares of different companies and businesses, and there is no harm in buying them, provided that you are certain that they are [Islamically] permissible businesses. You should not invest in companies that establish pubs or casinos, or companies involved in other illicit practices, saying that you are simply buying shares.
There are many established and lawful businesses in the world that you can become shareholders of. There are sugar mills, textile mills, the car industry, and other industries as well; these are all businesses that you can become shareholders of, and there are people who buy [such shares]. However, you should not turn this into a business and always be sitting in the shares market, always looking up and down to see where you can make money, where to draw your money, seeing how many shares to buy and how many to sell at the market price. When companies sell their shares, you can buy them.’[1]
ENDNOTES
1. This Week With Huzoor – 13 March 2020.
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