Toward ethical lending

On the list of what separates humans from our primitive ancestors, one activity usually gets neglected: lending with interest. Finance seems embedded in our DNA. We have debt records that date back more than 4,000 years. As the historian Niall Ferguson put it in his book, “The Ascent of Money: A Financial History of the World,” these ancient ledgers serve as “reminders that when human beings first began to produce written records of their activities, they did so not to write history, poetry or philosophy, but to do business.” Not surprisingly, debates about interest rates are nearly as old. Religious authorities, philosophers and even state officials have, at one point in the past, advocated a ban on interest altogether. Islam still considers interest sinful. Questioning interest, however, is as much an ethical debate as a financial one. Does a person with more resources have an obligation to help – free