Institutional Fatāwā

Standard 8 (Murābaḥah), Standard 9 (Ijārah), and Standard 12 (Diminishing Mushārakah) define the structural requirements for permissible home-finance contracts. The standards explicitly require: genuine ownership transfer, real risk-sharing, no pre-determined increase tied to a benchmark rate, no synthetic risk-elimination clauses. Most contemporary Western 'Islamic' mortgage products are graded against these standards.

Conventional bank interest is unambiguously riba per IIFA. The resolutions also address contemporary Islamic finance products with specific structural requirements largely overlapping AAOIFI's.

context under strict conditions: (a) genuine inability to access halal alternatives, (b) home is for primary residence not investment, (c) sincere intention to exit when possible, (d) ongoing repentance. AMJA does NOT issue a blanket permission — most of its fatāwā emphasise that the conditions are rarely fully met and that Islamic mortgage providers should be the first option explored.

The conditions are: (a) the loan is for the purchase of a primary residence, (b) the buyer does not own another suitable residence, (c) no halal alternative is realistically accessible, (d) the buyer commits to repaying as quickly as possible, (e) the buyer commits to never taking another riba loan once the need is met. The resolution is controversial in stricter circles and is the foundation of much contemporary 'ḥājah-based' permission discourse.

In a controversial 2002 fatwa under then-Mufti Dr. Muhammad Sayyid Tantawi (later Grand Imam of al-Azhar), the institution distinguished fixed-rate consumer banking transactions from classical riba al-nasīʾa in certain contexts. Subsequent muftis have re-emphasised the prohibition. The institution's overall position can be characterised as 'classical prohibition with case-by-case ḥājah accommodations'.

The 1965 resolution, the 1976 conference declaration, and subsequent rulings consistently reject the modernist reinterpretation that distinguishes 'consumer interest' from 'productive interest'. Al-Azhar is widely regarded as the most authoritative Sunni institution and its position is treated as definitive by mainstream Sunni scholarship.

The committee rejects the ḥājah-based permissions of ECFR/AMJA on the grounds that Islamic alternatives are sufficiently accessible in most Western contexts to invalidate the necessity claim. The committee's positions are collected in Fatāwā al-Lajnah al-Dāʾimah (multiple volumes).

The position is anchored in Hanafi fiqh and the writings of Mufti Muhammad Shafi (founder of the Pakistan Deobandi tradition) and Mufti Taqi ʿUsmānī. Deoband generally does NOT accept the ECFR-style ḥājah permission, holding that contemporary Islamic alternatives + community pooling (qard ḥasan) satisfy the necessity requirement.

Major Barelvi institutions include Jamia Ashrafia (Mubarakpur, India), Dar al-Iftaa Ahl al-Sunnat (various), and the fatwa departments of Sufi-affiliated madrasas. The positions broadly align with Deoband on riba while differing on devotional and spiritual matters.

Syed Muhammad Hashim) ruled that all forms of interest charged by financial institutions are riba and unconstitutional in Pakistan. The judgment ordered the elimination of interest from Pakistani banking. The Supreme Court reaffirmed this in 2022 ordering the State Bank of Pakistan to implement an interest-free system by 2027.

This has made Malaysia the world's largest Islamic finance market by volume but has created an enduring divergence between 'Malaysian-compliant' and 'AAOIFI-compliant' products. The SAC's position on conventional banking interest remains classical (prohibited); the disagreement is about which alternative structures qualify as halal.

1/2004 declared bank interest (bunga bank) to be riba and ḥarām. The fatwa has been foundational to Indonesian Islamic banking development. MUI's National Shariah Board issues detailed product-level fatāwā governing the Indonesian Islamic finance sector (the world's largest Muslim country by population).

Its resolutions are among the most widely-cited Gulf-scholarly references affirming that modern bank interest is riba, and it has addressed Islamic alternatives to interest-based lending.

It does not rule on whether a specific mortgage is permissible; it shapes how compliant institutions must be governed and capitalised. Included here for completeness because 'IFSB-aligned' is a real industry signal — but it speaks to prudential soundness, not the fiqh of a contract.