INTRODUCTION
good morning it's a great pleasure to
introduce Sheikh Hamza Yusuf Sheikh
Hamza happens to be when the most
prominent Muslim scholars in the Bay
Area he's a teacher writer and scholar
and he's also the co-founder of Zaytuna
College the first Muslim liberal arts
college in the country established where
else here in Berkeley California he is
an advisor to Stanford University's
program in Islamic studies and the
Center for Islamic studies here at the
GTU he also serves as a member of the
Board of Advisors of George Russell's
One Nation a national philanthropic
initiative that promotes pluralism and
inclusion in America he also serves as
vice president for the global Center for
guidance and renewal recently Hamza
Yusuf was ranked as the Western world's
most influential Islamic scholar by the
500 most influential Muslims edited by
John Esposito and Ibrahim Killeen Shaikh
Homs has authored any number of
encyclopedia articles and research
papers and several books including
purification of the heart the content of
character the Creed of imam al Tahari
agenda to change our condition walking
on water and the prayer of the oppressed
and is forthcoming
the helpful guide and I just want to say
a little bit about sheikh hamza x' work
basically we can serve characterized in
three parts on the one hand the sheikh
hamza has been very influential in
reviving the authentic tradition of
Islamic scholarship which had suffered
all sorts of missed formations due to
colonialism as a tuna College is an
example of this of going back to the
roots of Islamic traditional education
and for that reason he has a great deal
of reputation credibility among you know
even non scholarly Muslims at the same
time he emphasizes that true
understanding of tradition goes beyond
the letter of the text to the spirit
that inspires the letter so he has
always emphasized in his research than
an understanding of the texts of Islamic
scholarship we
requires knowledge of the purification
of the heart of the ascetic and mystical
tradition of self-development which
enables one to understand the actual
text of the letter and then the third
part of its work is applying this to the
contemporary situation so Sheikh Hamza
has been an outspoken and passionate
critic of all kinds of social justice
and extremism whether it's the extremism
of global elites and militarism or the
counter extremism of pseudo Islamic
extremists Sheikh Hamza has been
credited for say persuading edge Hussain
to abandon extremism so Sheikh Hamza
working basically be described as a kind
of bridge building and connecting of
worlds connecting the worlds of
tradition and modernity and the worlds
of west and east which blends in
perfectly well with Graduate theological
unions in Pacific School of religions
mission and purpose so it's a my great
pleasure and honor to introduce Sheikh Hamza Yusuf
Main Speech (Shaykh Hamza Yusuf)
[Applause]
Thank you. okay we good all right thank you sorry about that it was a I guess that's my introduction
In the name of God the Most Merciful The Most Compassionate I appreciated that I
always take those things with a serious
grain of salt like being the most
influential Muslim scholar in the West
because I'm having a hard time
influencing my 16 year old right now so
we know about influence the the the also
the description of a bridge builder
I'd prefer rather to be described as
somebody who's just trying to show
bridges that are already there we don't
need to build bridges building bridges
is a lot of effort and work I think we
should use the ones that are already
there but oftentimes the fog of war and
other things cloud our vision when
there's a lot of fog in San Francisco
you can't even see the Golden Gate
Bridge this this is one of those things
I think that that relates to all of us
the that I was really happy and the
reason that I chose to do this was
because of the topic I I've been
actually not doing a lot of things like
the trying to get the things I already
have to do done so but the topic this
topic is one of the most fascinating
topics to me and it's fascinating for a
number of reasons that one of the most
important is the complete disconnection
that so many people have with wealth and
I want to give you an example how many
people know John Robbins not that many
I'm surprised I love John Robbins he's
wonderful guy his father was one of the
founders of Baskin and Robbins he he
wrote
he he wrote he wrote diet for a new
America that was his first revolutionary
book saying don't eat ice cream he he
also he he's an extraordinary human
being he as a young man idealistic went
to Vancouver built a log cabin with his
wife lived on an island in Vancouver and
without electricity raised his children
there his son this is kind of the 60s
people here can relate to this his son
named ocean is also doing things so he
was part of that idealistic generation
that listened to too many Bob Dylan
songs and and took this stuff seriously
and and dropped out what's interesting
is when he came back after several years
he began to advocate for a lot of things
related to social justice diet is one of
them because we don't realize the
connection between what we eat and
ethics which is very important not just
the Ethical Treatment of Animals which
is one aspect of it because the animals
today are no longer farm animals they
are literally commercial products they
have nothing to do with a traditional
idea Old MacDonald had a farm e-i-e-i-o
McDonald's now owns the farm and it's
not that you know the pig and the cow
having a good time anymore so but one of
the things that intrigued me I got his
book the new good life living better in
an age of less and he talks about this
crisis that we're in and how it's
actually an opportunity but what really
struck me was he admits and I think
courageously that he lost all of his
money in this crises because all of his
money was invested with Bernie Madoff
and so I think it's just so amazing that
somebody who I believe is a truly
ethical person but the fact that he was
living off stolen money because a Ponzi
scheme you're not living off your money
that was already spent you're living off
the money of other people that have now
invested into the Ponzi scheme and so
this to me illustrate SPRO found
this incredible disconnect that we have
in the United States between our wealth
how we invest it and what the wealth is
actually doing out there in the world
and this doesn't just mean investment
somebody who wrote best-selling books
has money to invest most people don't
but it also means the ethical choices
that you make every day when you buy
right we and and now the corporations
are wising up to this so now they're
putting like Fairtrade stamps and and a
lot of this stuff is unregulated so we
really don't know what's going on but
they recognize that there are people
that are deeply troubled by the type of
world that we're living in right now and
the imbalances that we have so I want to
look at a pre-modern person who dealt
with these things and one of the things
about Dante Dante is very troubling for
Muslims and I'll get to that later but
Dante is also somebody who and I think
the theses of his indebtedness to the
Islamic tradition is is airtight for
somebody that knows the tradition very
well and knows Dante reasonably well the
I think I've seen palacios who's the
Spanish Catholic priest who first put
forward this thesis that Dante had been
influenced by what's known as the
nocturnal or the Night Journey of the
Prophet Mohammed where he goes through
hell he's guided by Gabriel he and then
ascends to the heights and then into
paradise ultimately to experience the
beatific vision and to come back the the
similarities are so extraordinary and
many of the things that you find in
Dante are not from Christian tradition
and Christians know this that it's
usually seen as from the imagination of
Dante now to say that Dante stole like
they say mediocrity is to borrow
geniuses to steal there's nothing really
wrong with stealing Shakespeare was
constantly stealing things from most of
his plays our plots taken from other
playwrights but the genius is making it
your own this is a title lenders
leopards and lions he divides
into the sins of the Leopards the sins
of the Lions and the sins of the wolves
and then the violence of avarice because
we we don't really think of avarice as
being a violent crime or a violent sin
but in in this medieval tradition it was
so these are my musings from these these
trenches in Dante's hell the pre-modern
world view among Abrahamic people and
amongst all people the pre-modern world
was a metaphysical world people before
modernity lived in a world in which they
recognized that this was not the world
this was Maya it was one in the Arabic
tradition it was completely FNS it it
was trans it was something that was
transient by its nature would dissipate
before we knew it but it also was
symbolic and this is why Plato for
instance did not want image makers and
this is one of the things that Neil
postman argues in amusing ourselves to
death that in the second in the
Decalogue the second commandment not to
make any graven images unto God and not
to make any images whatsoever I mean if
you read the the original commandment
it's very specific about not making
images at all and Postman argues that if
a God who is a complete abstraction the
idea of God wanted human beings to
understand him or her or it however you
want to phrase it the the God would have
to be a god that was understood through
symbols through abstraction in the mind
not tangible and so the idea of idolatry
was such an anathema to the Abrahamic
traditions the iconoclast
influenced by the Muslims during the
Byzantine period actually destroy a lot
of the icons it's interesting that the
only icons that we have from that period
and in in the late 7th and early 8th
century are the ones that were
from the monasteries that were protected
by the Muslims so the Greeks went around
destroying all these icons so the the
pre-modern world was a world of
metaphysics and Plato felt that the
danger of images was that it would take
people they would be now twice removed
from reality so if you have a television
and you're watching reality TV you're
actually twice removed from reality
because the actual thing that's
happening that you're watching whether
it's recorded or live are images of
images and so he saw the danger of
having those images now one of the
aspects of the pre-modern world view was
morality was at the center of the human
condition the Ten Commandments are
universal Commandments you will find
these in many many traditions some form
of the Ten Commandments it's it's
actually quite extraordinary how
widespread they are if you look at the
core ethics of the Quran it's clearly
from the Ten Commandments the obstacles
to fulfilling the Ten Commandments are
the seven deadly sins according to st.
Gregory the Great a one of the great
Catholic leaders now in Dante's world
sin was something you struggled against
it was not something you indulged in it
was something something you actually
struggled against if you go to Las Vegas
as you enter into Las Vegas there's a
big banner in the airport that says
surrender to your desires and then what
what happens here stays here so one of
the things that advertising people have
learned is that the seven deadly sins
make great selling points so have the
Mercedes and you're gonna look better
than everybody else on the
you're gonna have respect you'll also
get the envy of other people luxurious
so these these these seven deadly sins
were central to that worldview but one
of the interesting things about the
Mount of Purgatorio was at the base was
pride and and don t doesn't really deal
did the whole Divine Comedy in the in
the inferno pride is constantly there
but it's not mentioned in the same way
that the other sins are mentioned
because it's just understood that is the
root problem greed and pride were the
root problems according to st. Thomas of
the human condition but what's
interesting about this mountain as as
you climb up the mountain it gets
lighter and easier so it's the opposite
of a worldly mountain the spiritual
mountain gets actually easier now one of
the things about Jesus which is
interesting I mean there are many things
interesting about him but one of the
things that's very interesting is that
when he was one of the teachers of law
came and heard them debating noticing
that Jesus had given them a good answer
he asked him of all the commandments
which is the most important now you
could look at this the 613 commandments
of the Torah or you could look at it as
the Ten Commandments the most important
one jesus answered is is this here o
Israel the shinai the Lord our God the
Lord is one love the Lord your God with
all your heart and with all your soul
and with all your mind and with all your
strength the second is this love your
neighbor as yourself
there is no commandment greater than
these what Jesus does in in this
incredibly sick synched manner is to sum
up the Ten Commandments because the
first three Commandments are about
loving God about honoring God believing
in God about honoring the Sabbath and
then it's loving the neighbor it's don't
kill don't steal those are acts of
hatred towards the neighbor honor your
parents those are the closest neighbors
that you have growing up and don't covet
your neighbor's Goods don't bear false
witness this is all loving the neighbor
so he reduces the Ten Commandments to
two Commandments now what's interesting
about that is he makes it a positive
most of the ten commands
our negatives but he makes it a positive
that love is a positive force in the
world and this is really Dante's vision
in the inferno because Dante sees that
love is at the root of all of this you
have and he ends his his Paradiso with
love so it's it's the last line in in
the in the entire poem he has loved
excessive love perverted and love
wanting these are the human problems now
Dante he finds himself the middle of his
life he was born in 1265 this takes
place in in 1300 and Dante is he's a
fascinating character for a number of
reasons one of them is that he is a
devout Catholic and yet he's deeply
influenced by rationalism he's
definitely a secularist he really wants
to see separation of church and state
he's also very anti-clerical he in fact
he's never been beatified I mean he's
you know he stuck half the Pope's in
hell so and he really he had a problem
with the church but like all great
Patriots their greatest act is to point
out what needs to be corrected you see
the jingoistic type of approach never
works those are the flatterers that tell
you there's nothing wrong it's the
people that point out what needs to
change and that's what he was really
involved in doing but he enters the
inferno and you know abandon hope all ye
who enter here
III had a an idea of doing a theme park
based on the inferno
because because we love theme parks
right I was actually on mr. Toad's Wild
Ride with my children and I realized at
Disneyland that mr. Toad's Wild Ride is
kind of a minion fare no because because
he actually goes to hell in that I don't
know if there is it's a terrible thing
to do to a five-year-old you know it's
just a trevally frightening thing but he
mr. toad actually he he goes to hell but
then suddenly it's like no you get a
second chance and and so you you're back
out all right it's start over but the he
enters the what's interesting is first
of all he sees this incredible array of
humanity and he's like I can't believe
hell is undone so many and the first
group that are actually in a vestibule
out outside of Hell proper they're in
hell but it's it's outside of Hell
proper and these are the tremors these
are the people that were neither for
good nor evil they were only for
themselves and and they they have a
banner that has nothing on it
representing the meaninglessness of
their lives and they're running about to
and fro with these insects biting them
and stinging them on their heads as
reminders of what they should have done
so but then he moves into the sins of
the leopard which are the sins of youth
and he has in their luxurious
Ola aviary Shion IRA luxurious lust it's
the Latin word for lust which is an
interesting word that is is related to a
kind of spreading out like sorry as a
looseness we talk about loose morals the
idea of not being able to contain
oneself and then you have gula which is
where we get gluttony from and and it's
a wonderful almost an amount of pattaya
type word because it just sounds so much
like the actual act and then aviary
Hsieh which is a beautiful word which we
get avid reader is a greedy reader it's
from the same root from a Sanskrit word
avati which means to crave or to desire
and so
greed is a craving which is also hungry
is is related to greed it's the same as
you go back to the ancient cognates
you'll find that greed and hunger are
the same so the idea of greed is a
craving and we know the second noble
truth of the Buddha is craving is at the
root of our problems
so the sin of luxurious is an
interesting one I want to talk and this
is always religious people always going
on about lust and pornography and and
this is the obsession of Christianity
for for too long
right I mean Christians and it's kind of
driven everybody mad I think they've
kind of gone to that extreme because
they just couldn't take the sermons
anymore but you know I I want to say
that I don't think people are really
aware of this problem I think a lot of
good people that that and not to say
other people are bad people but people
that you know that people that aren't
engaged in these type of things don't
really understand the extent of this
problem and and when when a when a
society we're producing almost 90
percent of all the pornographic material
in the world and this is becoming it is
by far the predominant downloading now
going on on the internet there's a
wonderful you can google this if you'd
like there's a wonderful image on on on
youtube of a investment banker who's
live from australia and he's talking
about interest rates and behind him is
one of the investment bankers they're
downloading pornography this showed up
on live TV so he kind of gets caught
he's at work supposed to be crunching
numbers right and and he's downloading
pornography and somebody comes and
points it out to him that they're on
live TV back there and he's kind of in a
state of shock but this is a major
problem in terms of loss of time and
these things so what's interesting about
lust Dorothy Sayers who people know her
as a mystery writer
was also I think a first-rate theologian
Dorothy Sayers argues that there are two
reasons for lust becoming predominant in
a culture or in a person in a person it
can be sometimes from what she calls an
abundance of animal spirits in other
words there a lusty person there there's
somebody that has a lot of vital energy
and this vital energy can be dissipated
in sexual pursues but the other one is
that she said that in a society that has
lost meaning she said that this pursuit
can become a type of in essence it's
it's a distraction from the troubling
emptiness that is there and this is
something that Kierkegaard recognizes
because Kierkegaard talks about the
estate the the aesthetic man he said at
the high level and the estate this is
what so answered about Kierkegaard is
that Kierkegaard recognizes that the guy
at the Opera do you know the guy at the
opera titillating his senses and
experiencing these things and is
obsessed with the aesthetic life is no
different from this guy down on the
pornographic downloading that it's the
same type of impulse that is causing us
to pursue these things that's my little
graphic there now in the United States
now it's estimated that only 3% of boys
and 17% of girls have never seen
internet pornography and I know just
from my own experience on the internet
you can find images like when I was
trying to get some of these images
pornographic images popped up on the
image thing in Google and you're
supposed to report them so people upload
these images this is a real problem in
our country and then if you look at the
statistics that are going on beyond
really beyond belief it's quite tragic
so I will just as a side note I
participated and wrote a paper BAE
Dante's Inferno with the Witherspoon
Institute this is called the social
costs of pornography and my papers in
here my paper was originally titled
climbing Mount purgatorio reflections
from the seventh cornice which is the
cornice of lust and they changed it I
guess the Catholics kind of wanted the
Muslim to have a non Catholic title
maybe I don't know the but gula which is
gluttony I don't I didn't that image the
person that put that up put that up I
really wouldn't want to do that to
somebody the prevalence of obesity in
the United States is really quite
stunning what's happening in our country
obviously some of it you know one at one
of our scientists at the National
Institute of Health said that we're
making food now like crack cocaine
because they found that high fat and
high sugar rats cannot stop eating it
and so the people that the hand for C
corporations know these things and this
is the ruthlessness and the impersonal
nature and the really a moral nature and
immoral nature but this is what's
happening so you can see since 1974 to
2004 just look at that and if you look
these are doubling and one of the things
about exponential growth if you
understand the doubling factor and I'll
get into that when we talk about usury
but it's very dangerous to see doubling
happening now every Hsieh which is greed
this this American thing I'm not calling
them a greedy family this is more just a
normal family in America it's obviously
for they were from I think Texas very
Christian she's got the Bible as the
centerpiece of their possessions which i
think is quite lovely but if you look at
the amount of goods they have and this
comes from a wonderful book of people
that went around the world taking
pictures of the average person in that
country and they would have the family
come out and have all their possessions
and and you you see places like Bhutan
where they've got like a few blankets
and some pots to cook with and
and they they're beaming with radians
they look so happy and I can attest this
because I actually lived with Bedouins
in West Africa and the Bedouin that I
live with the tribe that I lived with
which moved three times in the year
lived in tents the the the possession
was always contained in a chest all
their worldly possessions in a chest and
it was a great gift to live with them
because one of the things I learned from
them is you do not need very much our
needs are very very few and and one of
the things about those people is I never
really saw any depression or people that
were troubled they were really happy
people prozac hasn't had a market there
yet it's a this is from st. Thomas it is
a sin directly against one's neighbor
greed since one man cannot over abound
in external riches without another man
lacking them it is a sin against God
just as all mortal sins in as much as
man contemned things eternal for the
sake of temporal things that's at the
essence of this and then IRA I'm gonna
get back to grieve because it doesn't go
away when we get to violence IRA is is
wrath and an anger now here we are in
Dante's extraordinary vision of Hell
which actually comes from the Islamic
tradition which has circles going down
and some of the prophets Elias nm did
not write this but some of the Muslim
writers had it burrowing in to the earth
and they also unlike the Christian
tradition there is a tradition in Islam
that ice is the deepest punishment in
hell which is where Dante gets this
frozen lake where the demon is now as
dante enters into limbo these are for
the righteous pagans what's interesting
is he puts a very wheeze even the
Russian and even Xena there and
Salahuddin AUV so this is because limbo
is not that bad
it's probably like motel 6 as opposed to
the Fairmont it's really not that bad
it's green it's got the seven mountains
that represent the seven virtues and
you're not really suffering there but
you're distant from God so that's that's
the punishment and and then Dante is
informed also that when Christ died he
came and took all the Old Testament
prophets out of there and brought them
into heaven so obviously it can't be
that bad if those great men were put
there and then he the next circle is the
lustful the gluttonous the avaricious
the prodigal the wrathful and the sullen
he's got two groups of the wrathful and
the they're the ones that express their
wrath and they're there they're in the
lake and they're they're all fighting
each other and then the sullen ones that
interiorize their anger and become
depressed resentful and angry at the
world
but they're not expressing it outwardly
and then we moved to sticks which is the
hateful river and he borrows from
greco-roman tradition and then he has
the heretics and heretics eros eya and
Greek comes from a word which means to
choose for yourself
so the heretics are those who choose for
themselves no out outward authority in
in many ways we are the heretical
generation the modern world is a world
of heretics I'm you know I did it my way
Frank Sinatra the great singer so the
and then he moves into the seventh
circle and this is where the sins of
violence are and they're the the violent
that are against their neighbor and
these are the tyrants the war mongers
the murderers these are the people that
are the purveyors of war so violence are
the sins of the lion these are the sins
of manhood in the way that the leopard
which are the sins of incontinence the
inability incontinence which now just
means incontinence to stool and urine in
medical terminology means you can't hold
your urine or your feces it used to mean
you just couldn't control yourself a
crazy ax it was the idea of just
somebody that did not have the moral
fiber to hold themselves within the
boundaries of morality
so the sins of the lion are the violent
ones now if you look at the you know the
world that we were living in right now
again the exponential factor here is is
quite frightening but these are the
types of money that we're putting in to
military and this is a much more
accurate you know one of the things that
the official records want to say is that
our military budgets about 20% and
that's the the the government's official
one but if you actually look at all
their finagling and see how it's quite
clever how they do it I mean it's
wonderful if you if you look at at New
York New York is the only state in our
Union that has a budget they have to
actually have a fiscal budget that stays
within the boundaries that's a clause in
their state constitution that they
actually cannot do deficit financing
well how do they get around that they
were 200 million short not that long ago
so they sold Attica prison to themselves
for 200 million dollars I'm not making
this up does this this literally happens
this is the type of stuff that goes on
Clinton they always talk about how
during the Clinton period it was Oh last
time we had we didn't have a deficit
that was a surplus right look at the
really what happened and you'll see that
they they were digging into the social
security funds so they didn't have to
borrow the money they just took from
future people seriously I mean this this
is this is what's happening so if you
look at at the warmongering that goes on
and we have to deal with this this is
our country here's our budget in
relation to the rest of the world we are
15 times we're 15 times greater than all
of the the next group combined and 12 of
these are strong allies I mean you look
at Canada Canada it's it's it's number
14 there and they're a strong ally of
the United States and if you look Saudi
Arabia that's just corporate welfare by
the way cuz Saudis never use their
hardware they never fight wars I mean
when they got into trouble they called
on America so all the weapons are just
there waiting for the Americans to use
right but they're number eight all that
those Petro dollars this the
military-industrial complex is at the
root of these sins of violence and this
is something that unfortunately because
we as Americans we view ourselves as
always wearing the white hat you we
don't you know collateral damage isn't
that's not terrorism because hey we
didn't mean to kill them even though
they have statisticians in the Pentagon
that tell them how many civilians are
going to die probabilistically they know
that but we didn't intend to do it it's
just an important fortunate byproduct of
war so this is the type of environment
now this was an act of violence against
this country but Iraq wasn't our act of
violence against a country that had
nothing to do with this act of violence
and so this is these are the cycles of
violence that are perpetrated constantly
and we can never get out of them and and
and so these these violent sins and then
violence against themselves because it's
interesting how they're they're the same
sides of one coin right two sides to the
same coin now
and then he's got blasphemers against he
has the blasphemers and and then the
sodomites now what's interesting about
the sodomites in Dantes I don't want
that's not fair a friend of my did that
what what's interesting about the the
sodomites is if you look at Ezekiel now
this was the sin of your sister Sodom
she and her daughters were arrogant
overfed and unconcerned they did not
help the poor and the needy they were
haughty and did detestable things before
me therefore I did away with them this
is also consistent with the Platonic
narrative one of the sins of the
sodomites was they raped guests and and
in the Platonic narrative they come to
the house of lot and they demand that he
surrender their guests so that they can
rape their guests and so the this is a
violent society they had they express it
through sexual violence but it is a
violent Society and I think that's
important to remember and he actually
has a kind word to one of them who was
his teacher
Dante now now we get to the users and
these are the this is the crime against
art that's that's how it's produced now
art in the medieval world view was
production it was the idea of production
that you produce things Christ and his
three-year mission the only time he gets
violent is with the users chasing them
out of the temple now if you look at the
abrahamic you can look at these these
are all in exodus leviticus take no
usery or interest from him but fear your
God that your brother may live with you
you shall not lend him your money for
usury nor lend him your food at a profit
if one of your brethren becomes poor and
falls into poverty among you then you
shall help him like a stranger or a
soldier that he may live with you and
then to a foreigner you may charge
interest it's interesting st. jerome and
if you look at the early church father
st. jerome has a very famous statement
about ubi
just bel i boobie ATM juice user i if
it's just to wage war on them it's just
to charge users
that's how he understood that that the
that the stranger was actually somebody
who was an enemy and then this was the
Jubilee right you know what they would
say today our economist oh that creates
moral hazard right seriously that's
exactly how that how they would look at
that and then this is Ezekiel also right
so and and this is a just man who does
what's lawful and right he doesn't eat
on the mountains where the idolaters
used to eat and or lifted his eyes to
idols nor defiled his neighbor's wife
nor approached a woman in her impurity
if he has not oppressed anyone but he
has restored the debtor to his pledge
he's robbed no one by violence taken no
Ussery if he had not extracted using nor
taken any increase but has withdrawn his
hand from iniquity and executed true
justice between a man and a man if he
has walked in my statutes and kept my
justice judgments faithfully he is just
now in the Jewish tradition and the Jews
in European tradition were forced into
usury it's very interesting if you
studied they used that a lot of the
European sovereigns would have the Jews
as tax collectors and this is like
having african-american police in inner
cities do you know it's it's it's it's
kind of it I mean that's an opposite
example of that it's trying to deflect
but it's what the tax collector when he
was Jewish if he would come they would
see the Jew and not the sovereign so
they would see the Jew as an oppressor
and that was literally designed I mean
these people were were Machiavellian in
their in their in their outlook so but
this is from the Talmud every man's
Talmud by dr. Cohen one method of
earning a living which was condemned in
scathing terms by the rabbi's was usury
a man who practice it was precluded from
giving evidence in a court of law come
and see the blindness of the user errs
if a man call his fellow a villain the
latter proceeds against him even to the
extent of depriving of his live with it
but user errs take witnesses scribe pen
and ink and write and seal the document
to the
I mean woody guthrie put that in a more
popular phrase when he said some men
will rob you with a six-gun and some
with a fountain pen and so that's what
he's alluding to but he said no matter
how far you roam you'll never see an
outlaw take a family from its home not
like the bankers whoever has money and
lends it without interest of him as
written he that putteth not out his
money to user he shall never be moved
hence you can learn that if a man lends
on interest his possessions will be
moved users are comparable to shedders
of blood Cato the Elder was asked about
user he he said user II asked me about
murder he equated it with murder and
there's reasons for that would that the
monitor people don't understand
unfortunately because we don't fully
grasp it one of the most important
things and this is why it's so good to
see this issue being addressed justo
Gonzales and I would recommend reading
this book faith and wealth a history of
early Christian ideas on the origin
significance and use of money in
Gonzales his book what he shows very
clearly is one of the most central and
important issues that Christians were
grappling with was the ethical use of
wealth they were obsessed with it in
their writings but what he says on the
outlines of the actual relationship
between faith and wealth there's and
there is also remarkable unanimity it's
one of the few things they really agreed
on to the point that certain themes
appear again and again usery by witches
usually meant any loan on interest is
universally condemned in the early
church the one possible exception is
clement of alexandria who may have held
that the prescription of loans on
interest applies only to loans to other
believers but even this possibility is
based only on a debatable interpretation
of a single text so user ii was seen as
condemned and and this is obviously the
chasing them out love your enemies do
good to them and lend to them without
expecting to get anything right even
your enemies so this is really
abrogating that idea of lending to the
the enemy which is why he put it in
there and it's interesting that modern
Christians have justified usury with the
Luke story about the man who comes with
the the talons and he gives his each one
he gives him ten and five and one and
then two of them work it in the third
one he just hides it and he says oh I
knew you're an austere and cruel man and
you take what's not yours and you reap
what you don't sell so I just hit it and
here it is here and he said you you're
your condemnation of me is my judgment
against you you should have known that I
would have wanted more and you should
have put it in a bank and gotten
interest so he used the example of a
wicked tyrant that everybody hates and
says well there's Jesus he's saying user
he's okay
they have very weird interpretation but
hey that's Scripture yeah the nature of
the sin called user has his proper place
in origin in a loan contract this
financial contract between consenting
parties demands by its very nature that
one returned to another only as much as
he has received the sin rests on the
fact that something the creditor desires
more than he's given therefore he
contends some gain is allowed to him
beyond that which he loaned but any gain
which exceeds the amount he gave his
illicit and user EAA's this is an
encyclical a papal encyclical which is
basically Church doctrine the Pope
writes it and then sends it out to all
the churches this is not ex cathedra in
other words it's not considered
infallible because the Pope's rarely use
ex cathedra as a doctrine and but this
was sent in 1745 it was all over by Pope
Benedict the 14th and then it was again
applied to the in cyclical to the whole
the Roman Catholic Church in 1836 during
the reign of Pope Gregory and dr. Noonan
one of the great Catholic scholars says
that it's impossible say that there was
not universal agreement on the
prohibition of usury charging for the
loan of money is unjust as such for you
are selling something that doesn't exist
this is the important distinction that
the the medieval 's understood that
money is a means of exchange
it is not meant in and of itself to be a
source of income you can invest money by
buying goods and products and selling
them as a businessman but when you loan
money and make money off the money you
have perverted the purpose of money
which is a means of exchange and you
have made it an end as a good is an end
this is how they understood it the word
in Greek for usury was tacos which means
to give birth and this is why he has
them on a barren sandy completely on
fertile because what they've done is
they've made something that should be
unfertile in its essence but it causes
things to grow if it's used properly and
so this is this is a Thomas saying some
things like food are concerned by use so
that the use can't be separated from the
thing when we let someone use such
things and we transfer the ownership of
the thing itself so if you sell a
sandwich you've transferred the
ownership of sandwich and so the use of
the sandwich was which its consumption
is you can't charge them for that and
that's why bankers literally get their
cake and eat it too literally
it's amazing so so now when we let
somebody use such things than we
transfer knowledge if we tried to sell
wine and it's used separately we would
be selling the same thing twice over or
selling something non-existent that
would clearly be unjust by the same
token then it is unjust to lend wine and
then as for the twofold recompense the
restoration of some equivalent and
charge for its use this is what user he
is a use charge in such cases there are
however things which are not in this
abuse
st. Thomas always preempts what you're
gonna object to right he even really
he's quite stunning in that he
constantly does that he just he thinks
okay what are they gonna say to this one
and then boom he answers you so he said
there are however things which are not
consumed by you a house is used by
living in it not by pulling it down so
here we can separate the thing from its
use transferring the ownership for
example while reserving the use for
or vice-versa allowing someone the use
and retaining its ownership this is why
one can listen for a houses use and
later ask for its return as happens in
letting and renting so now Aristotle
tells us money was invented for the
purpose of exchange and that its prime
and proper use is in its consumption and
disbursement by being spent in
transactions it follows that it is in
principle wrong to charge for the loan
of money as is done in usury now in the
Islamic view allodynia Karuna rely upon
Allah , a poem on Lydia Taha Babu who
ship an omen and mess those who devour
usery
will rise only like the one who rises to
be knocked down by a demon as if
possessed by madness my teacher said
Abdullah remember who's one of the
foremost authorities on Islamic finance
said that this is the boom-bust cycle of
a new serious society they rise only to
be knocked down and this will happen
again and again throughout history the
Quran says those who consume interest
cannot stand except this one stands who
is being beaten by Satan as a demon oh
you have believed do not consume user he
doubled and multiplied but fear that you
may be in order to be successful now in
traditional views of all forms of wealth
acquisition the most unnatural and
odious is that by means of usury
Aristotle in the politics John Addison I
love this one a moneylender he serves
you in the present tense he lends you in
the conditional mood keeps you in the
subjunctive and ruins you in the future
I mean really great stuff nothing like
the English for stringing words together
usery dolls and damps all industries
improvements and new inventions where
and money would be stirring if it were
not for this slug provision and that's
why why how are they trying to stimulate
the economy now they just keep lowering
the interest rate right just keep
lowering it down but there's deeper
problems and this is I'm gonna get to
this anyway john maynard keynes says
this very interesting that he used he
was brought up to believe that the
attitude of the church was to the rate
of interest was inherently absurd and
that the subtle discussions aimed at
distinguishing between the return of
money loans from the return of active
investments were merely Jesuitical
attempts to find a practical escape from
a foolish theory but I now read these
discussions as an honest intellectual
effort to keep separate what classical
Theory has inextricably confused
together the rate of interest and the
marginal efficiency of capital and he
distinguished he invented the marginal
efficiency of capital so that's the nice
thing about inventing your own terms is
that you define them as well
so but he basically the marginal
efficiency of counts of capital is what
it's worth which is not necessary the
interest rate so most economists would
see the same thing he saw it as
different but his point was is that they
recognize there is a difference between
the capital itself and and and the
interest itself and they distinguish
between those two and and but it's
prohibition is is for a very different
reason
I already mentioned that from now back
to to Dante now we're in the fraud now
why why is greed violent fraud is not
one of the seven deadly sins and the
seven deadly sins Aquinas says deadly
sins are capital sins which means they
breed other sins in the same way that
you have moral virtues are virtues that
are the source or the matrix of other
virtues so courage when you think of
generosity generosity is a virtue but
generosity is subsumed under the virtue
of courage because you can't be generous
without courage your your your your your
literally going against the fear
of losing your wealth by giving it to
somebody else and so it's a very
sophisticated system but fraud st.
Thomas identifies these are called the
daughters of the seven deadly sins and
he has each of the sins have daughters
like one of the sins the daughters of
lust is that you begin to hate God you
begin to lose any sense of spirituality
because you're so subsumed by the
sensual but in the daughters of greed he
has treachery he has fraud
so fraud is a daughter of greed it's a
daughter of avarice yeah and it's
important to note also that the deadly
sins are not acts they are states of
being so greed is not an act it's a
symptom when you see somebody acting
greedily that what he's doing is a
symptom but the actual disease is a
state of being and so he's got the first
ones are the the panders and the
seducers the fraudulent men there's
there's a book now that was on the front
table of borders and Barnes & Noble
called the players Bible and it was a
book on how to seduce women like it
teaches you how to seduce women and and
what's interesting about this is that
apparently there's a whole underground
group of these guys that communicate on
internet and exchange how they do these
things I read an article about this and
it was quite shocking to see this but
this is this is a type of fraud like to
know the right things to say to a woman
in order to seduce her right and that's
what they do so they're fraudulent and
he he has this horrible geureon which is
a from from Greek mythology which is a
monster with a beautiful face and it's
got a poisonous tail and that's how he
personifies fraud and so and and and
this is also he's got the flatterers who
are literally up to it in cracked like
they're full of it literally I mean in
in Hell so there he's got the the
glutton the
witness our being rained down by feces
rain it's like so the flatterers are
those those people and this also is you
he would probably today put the ad
executives down here if he was a lot the
scientists are those who sell from Simon
Magus and in the New Testament who tries
to buy the gifts of the Holy Spirit and
puts obviously the church was having a
difficult time with that and then divin
errs astrologers and magicians he would
probably put people like and he put the
people of his time like the people that
read Dante knew all the names because
they were familiar with all the people
they were like celebrities of the time
so he would put probably like these
people dive in or dinners he would put
these guys on CNN who do the the
prognostication for where the stock
market's going you know telling you what
to buy and things like that and then
he's got the the Bears who are what the
Simon is are to the church the barriers
are to government they're the people
that accept bribes and then he's got the
hypocrites the thieves
fraudulent counselors and it's
interesting the man that advised Caesar
to cross the Rubicon is here so it's the
people that give fraudulent advice like
the people that told the to go into Iraq
for instance under false pretenses
because many of them knew and this is
all come out so we know that this is the
the the type of and then solar's of
scandal and schism this is where
unfortunately for Muslims he has the
Prophet Mohammed with Adi now I want to
and I you know this is difficult for me
but I would like to defend a little bit
Dante Dante Dante put him it in among
the schismatic s-- there is another
group in in the heretics which is where
the false prophets were he is not I'm
sorry not in in the he's in the the
false prophets are in the they're in the
eighth circle I think they're in the
first bowl gia he does not put them with
the false prophets he puts him
with the schismatic so now the
schismatic SAR the Eastern Churches and
this is in essence acknowledging that
these are believers but they saw schism
was actually because it created violence
and rupture in society it's also not a
disease of fraud and this is pointed out
by the commentators in Dante that he
puts him here because the the the fraud
is in their own misperception of the
world this is this is how he does it and
I also want to say that these people
that he puts here are not the people and
that's why people say oh he put his
enemies in hell and he was just cruel
and just know these are personifications
he is personifying the idea of schism
and that was something very close to a
deeply divided world between christians
and muslims who were fighting then as
unfortunately we are now so but then he
puts the falsifiers
alright now what's interesting to me
he's got the counterfeiters and the
alchemist and and and and the people
that the coin i want to look at this was
110 years ago when the earl lectures
were founded look at what the dollar the
purchasing power of the dollar was
alright because what you could buy you
see is it has diminished to the point so
for instance my grandfather who sold
bubblegum as a ten year old boy in in
San Francisco down on Market Street in
1906 he used to sell it I think for a
penny little packages of bubble gum so
all you have to do is look at how much
that package cost today and in those
days it was organic right so so you'd
even have to like double the price to
get the organic bubble gum but just look
at the purchasing power of the dollar
that has been declining and then our
debt 56 trillion and this is it's
actually higher than this now but this
is the current liabilities and unfounded
promises okay we only have about 15
trillion dollar
in circulation and this is what we owe
in liabilities Social Security met a cow
all these things okay I mean this is a
real crises so our current national
debts at about 12 trillion right and our
budget was close to two trillion so now
most of this again we're going a large
portion is going to defense and another
portion is going to interest on the
national debt now this is old wine in a
new bottle so because in the old days
you had gangsters and the thing about
gangsters is that they would just go in
and usually have like they would cover
and they'd go in and rob the bank now
they get on the boards it's much more
clever series and this is not
exaggeration there's a book called the
best way to rob a bank is to own one
and this is what these people have been
doing and it's really quite stunning now
I just look at this statement Wall
Street with its vast banks in New York
City and associated banks and all other
large cities suggested that there was a
prospect of most disastrous panic that
the world and and that had known unless
Congress gave them emergency currency
neither could these great swivel-chair
operators of Wall Street exploit the
commerce that would follow between the
war nations and our country has a great
profiteering game unless Uncle Sam came
to their aid and financially that is
would give them more currency okay
instead of aiding the people as the
Congress as the government should have
done Congress immediately passed and
emergency currency Act to Furness the
banks that the speculators controlled
all the money they should need till they
could operate the Federal Reserve Act
the speculators received from Uncle Sam
nearly four hundred million dollars okay
that would be about four hundred billion
today under the provisions of the
emergency currency act and when the
Federal Reserve Act really got to
operating they had nearly four hundred
million at one time under that act and
they could get as much more as they
wanted
that's congressman Charles Lindbergh
senior who was this the father of
Charles Lindbergh who flew across the
Atlantic he was a congressman that was
opposed to the Federal Reserve but my
point is is that it's the same game too
big to fail this is how it's all fear
and this is one of the things that the
the the panders and the seducers they
use fear and desire to trick people and
and and to get what they want now it is
an old maxim and a very sound one that
that he who dances should always pay the
fiddler now sir in the present case of
any gentleman whose money is a burden to
them choose to lead off a dance I am
decidedly opposed to the people's money
being used to pay the fiddler no one can
doubt that the examination proposed by
this resolution must cost the state some
ten or twelve thousand dollars a lot of
money in 1837 and all this to settle a
question in which the people have no
interest in about which they care
nothing these capitalists generally act
harmoniously and in concert to fleece
the people and now that they have got
into a quarrel with themselves we are
called upon to appropriate the people's
money to settle the quarrel because they
wanted money over a stock collapse that
happened and this is an old game now I
want to talk about America's great fairy
tale you see every culture has to have
some really profound fairy tale and and
ours is the Wizard of Oz now The Wizard
of Oz about the time the Earl lectures
were being initiated there was a
character named William Jennings Bryan
in fact a hundred and ten years ago he
would have just found out that he lost
the 1900 election for president he ran
on the anti-imperialism platform he was
an he was a pacifist they called him a
coward they considered him a coward he
was a pacifist
he was also pro farming and and our
farmers people have no idea how much our
farmers have suffered in this country
really the suicide rate is the highest
amongst farmers I mean these are people
tied to the land and when the lands
taken away from them and and they're
forced into this agribusiness Gresham's
dynamic which is that the cheaters drive
out the honest people now I just want to
look at this fairy tale because bomb was
was basically given us an allegory at
this time when he was writing this the
great debate in the United States was
over finance reform and
this Dorothea represents um the American
the good American from Kansas good
Midwest state she's on a farm and BOM
describes her her you know her aunt and
her uncle never smile it's a barren farm
because it's drought and then basically
she meets she goes to this land she
lands on the Wicked Witch of the East
Wall Street and she and and the
munchkins the little factory workers are
freed and they're really happy and then
the Good Witch of the North which is
where all the support for the populace
were come down and she gives her the
silver slippers which turned into ruby
slippers in the film but in the book
they're silver slippers and then she's
told to go to Oz because she wants to
get back to Kansas follow the yellow
brick road they were on the gold
standard in 1873 this country removed
the silver standard and they demonetised
silver which created an incredible
burden on farmers because gold was rich
people's money silver was poor people's
money and it was made illegal for people
to use and that's Bryan's famous the
cross of gold don't crucify us on a
cross of gold so the yellow brick road
leads that emerald forests the green
backs because the currency was tied to
the gold and and in the book they all
wear emerald glasses that have a string
connected to a gold belt and the
Scarecrow represents the kind of simple
farmers that were intelligent but not
educated and they needed a brain with
the thoughts I III could be thinking I'd
be another Lincoln if I only had a brain
and then the Tin Man is the industrial
factory workers who are dehumanized
by industry and and this is why the Tin
Man in the book says that he used to be
a real human being that was cutting the
wood but he would cut himself and and
the the tin makers would put him back
together until he became completely tin
but now he's lost his heart because this
is the alienation the dehumanization
that happens in factory workers and then
the Cowardly Lion is William Jennings
Bryant who was called a coward and and
needed the courage and the
power to do this they wanted to restore
bimetallism this was Hamilton's original
vision of this country to have a
bi-metal economy under a gold standard
the amount of credit the and by the way
at the end when she kills the Wicked
Witch of the the West which is where all
the farmers were being held it's the
yellow Wilkie's who are the the the
Chinese workers on the the railroad and
the winget monkeys who were the Native
Americans he was actually quite racist
towards Native Americans but they talked
about how we used to live on the land
and in the forest until these evil
people came and took us over and but how
does she kill the Wicked Witch liquidity
because because that's what they needed
they needed a cash infusion and and she
kind of dissolves into thin air right
what does she say
now I want you to really think about
this I'm coming to a close I know that
because I have to come to an end here
under a gold standard the amount of
credit that an economy can support is
determined by the economy's tangible
assets since every credit instrument is
ultimately a claim on some tangible
asset but government bonds are not
backed by tangible wealth only by the
government's promise to pay out of
future tax revenues and cannot easily be
absorbed by financial markets a large
volume of new government bonds can be
sold to the public only at progressively
higher interest rates thus government
deficient spending deficits spending
under a gold standard is severely
limited the abandonment of the gold
standard made it possible for the
welfare status to use the banking system
as a means to unlimited credit they have
created paper reserves in the form of
government bonds which through a complex
series of steps the banks accept in
place of tangible assets and treat as if
they were an actual deposit this is just
on a ledger in the in the Federal
Reserve as the equivalent of what was
formerly gold the holder of a government
bond or of a bank deposit created by
paper tzer's believes that he has a
valid claim on a real asset the law of
supply and demand is not to be conned as
the supply of money of claims increases
relative to the supply of tangible
assets in the economy prices must
eventually rise thus the earnings saved
by the productive members of society
lose value in terms of goods so if
you're saving money you're losing money
in this system when the economy's books
are finally balanced one finds that this
loss in value represents the goods
purchased by the government for welfare
or other purposes
really it's all defense spending but the
money proceeds and interests of the
government bonds financed by bank credit
expansion in the absence of the gold
standard there is no way to protect
savings from confiscation through
inflation there's no safe store of value
if there were the government would have
to make it illegal as it was done in the
case of gold back in the 30s if everyone
decided for example to convert all his
bank deposits to silver or copper right
they'd lose their purchasing power so
the financial policy of the welfare
state requires that there be no way for
the owners of wealth to protect
themselves this is the shabby secret of
the welfare state as tirades against
gold deficit spending is a simply a
scheme for the confiscation of wealth
gold standards stand in the way of the
insidious process it stands as a
protector of property
if one grasp this one has no difficulty
in understanding the status antagonism
towards the gold standard that was Alan
Greenspan okay
that's true statement alan greenspan a
man who is furnished with arguments from
the mint will convince his antagonists
much sooner than any than one who draws
them from reason and philosophy gold is
a wonderful clearer of understanding it
dissipates every doubt and scruple in an
instant accommodates itself to the
meanest of capacities silences the loud
and clamors and brings over the most
obstinate and inflexible philip of
macedon was a man of most invincible
reason this way he refuted by it all the
wisdom of athens confounded their
Statesman's struck their orders dumb and
at length argued them out of all their
liberties that was addison again when
the freedom they wish for most was the
freedom from responsibility then Athens
ceased to be free and never was free
again that's one of our greatest
scholars on on the Greco tradition I'd
like to end with a poem by Robert Frost
because in the end for me the real two
sources of truth in this world are
revelation and poets and in the Islamic
tradition you can't separate the two
it's a prerequisite to comment on the
poor on that you have to master the
pre-islamic poets literally that is
agreed upon in Islamic tradition what
what poetry enables us the poets
penetrate and the poets are inspired and
and Dante was an inspired poet we can
look at the kind of there are many
things that we would object to but
ultimately Dante's vision is a vision of
every man and every woman's journey back
to God and in the end when Dante has the
beatific vision and and he sees it he's
he says and already my desire and my
will were made one turning by a wheel
yet at one speed the desire and the will
become one there's no more tension
between one's impulses and one's moral
rectitude and then he says
turned by the love that moved the
planets and the stars that love of God
Robert Frost wrote two poems about
economics and one of them he never
published it's called not it's called on
the inflation of the currency 1919 which
was when Wilson inflated the incurrence
he printed up a lot of money in order to
in order to pay for the war debts and he
said the pain of seeing 10 cents turned
to five we clutch with both hands
fiercely at the part we think we feel it
in the head the heart is someone cutting
us in two alive is somewhat at us
cutting us in half we cast a dangerous
look from where we lie up to the
enthroned it kings of earth and sky
they know what's best for them - well -
laughs that's about the bankers they've
convinced people that we need them
there are necessity they confiscate
wealth this misappropriation of wealth
is beyond belief in human history the
amount of money that's been taken out of
your homes people in this room the 401ks
that were destroyed and then he has
another poem and this is a warning to
America he says these words were cut in
stone for permanent these words so these
words I assume were so deeply met meant
they cut themselves in stone for
permanent like trouble in the brow above
the eyes and here's what's chiseled in
stone take care to sell your horse
before he dies the art of life is
passing losses on the city saying it was
Tessa Fong which may a little while by
war and trade have kept had have kept
from being caught with the decayed
infirm worn out and broken on its hands
but judging by what little of it stands
not even the ingenuities of debt could
save it from its law
is being met sand is thrusting in the
square of door across the tessellation
on the floor and only rests a serpent on
its chin content with contemplating
taking in until it can muster breath
inside a Hall inside a hall to rear
against the inscription on the wall
we're this country's money is being
destroyed really it's being destroyed
before our eyes and it's being destroyed
because of debt and debt is something
that is incredibly overwhelming for
people poor people have suffered the
most in this crises and until we take
the responsibility of understanding at a
deeper level the economics of the system
how it works we can't change anything it
was attempted William Jennings Bryan
attempted to do it a hundred and ten
years ago and there's a lot of people
now talking about this now whether we're
able to do it or not I don't know but
this system which is a global system now
and Ussery if you if you study how usery
works more interest on usury is going
out of the third-world countries than
aid going in this is just it's it's a
disgusting game and and it really should
end but whether we can end it or not is
is to be seen thank you very much
[Applause]
okay will now take questions from the
audience just just raise your hand if
you like ask the question thank you you
have continued a PSR tradition of
expanding our minds a lot of us own
homes I own a home isn't it fair for
there to be some interest charged on a
loan you know that's an argument that
was Calvin's argument Calvin
John Calvin was the French he was
originally Roman Catholic and then he
gets in trouble in the Inquisition moves
to Switzerland
the bankers actually erected a statue
for him because he's the first one that
legalizes usury in in in Christianity
but he did it by the idea of interest
and interest was originally a between
time if you delayed payment even by
church doctrine you could be charged in
the same way that they charge on credit
cards today if you're delayed that was a
reasoning what interest meant but what
Calvin did is he distinguished between
interest and usury and saw usury as
unjust or exorbitant at that time
anything higher than 12% would have been
considered usury Justinian the roman
emperor considered it 6% anything over
6% most people don't realize that a lot
of people in these pay day things are
paying sometimes 50% interest what the
bankers did is that they studied all of
the states and their interest laws and
they found out that Delaware and North
Dakota did not have interest law caps
and so they they put their operation
city cores in North Dakota not in New
York because there's usury laws in New
York huh
South Dakota sorry yeah South Dakota now
what's interesting is that
in smiley versus Citicorp smiley it's a
case that went to the Supreme Court
because they kept changing the rates on
on his his thing and so he actually
tried to see if he could put an end to
it and and the Supreme Court ruled
against smiley for Citicorp which ended
caps on these they used to charge five
dollars for a late fee now their shows
like $35 $40 the poorer you are the more
they charge even John Calvin who
accepted interest did not accept it for
poor people and what you have to
understand is the people that suffer
most are the poor people because they
get the worst rates and this is usury
you see most of you are probably in the
700s in your FICO score which is what
Fair Isaac that's the company that
determines it great Fair Isaac now one
of the things they don't tell you is
that anytime you miss a payment the
reason it suddenly drops is because they
want to raise your interest rates the
system's rigged against you but one of
the things that they have special files
for celebrities judges wealthy people
they don't do it to them because they
don't want these people to get angry and
make advocates the number one complaints
given to the Fair Business Bureau in the
United States is again is against credit
cards number one complaint people are
suffering out there most people don't
understand compound interest they don't
understand how if you pay the minimum
payment if we paid them the national
debt if we started paying it one dollar
a day it would take two hundred eighty
eight thousand years to finally pay it
off and in reality you could never pay
it off because of the nature of interest
so the point here is is you know
obviously companies have to make money
and things like that
renting money is in in the Islamic
tradition it's absolutely forbidden but
usury has always been even in the Muslim
world there's never been a society that
has been completely freed of interest
but there should be at least just rates
just rates and the people that suffer
most again are the poor people and and
we we should
advocates for these people because these
payday loans and people think these are
pawn brokers and schemers most of these
inner-city payday loans are owned by
Wells Fargo Bank of America seriously
it's just like it's it's like Disney you
know Disney has touchstone for their
racy films because they didn't want to
taint the name of Disney this is a very
sophisticated system and what you have
to realize is it's not that you know
they're all evil and is us and them this
is people that are afflicted with states
of being that are very unhealthy they're
not well and and part of what what what
you know just laws are to regulate
people from their own bad nature