Islam's Response to Contemporary Issues — Page 213
Economic Peace 213 certainly, it is man himself who is to be blamed for his utter callousness and disregard. If we fill the hearts of human beings with that special quality and are able to suffer for the sake of others, the world can still be turned into a paradise. In the world outside Islam, the same selfish attitude prevails. If Ethiopia, for instance, happens to have close ties with the Soviet Union, aid should not be withheld on the pretext that it is for the Soviet Union to discharge its responsibility as a patron. If millions of Muslims in Sudan are dying of hunger, their plight should not be ignored on the plea that wealthy nations like Saudi Arabia and other oil-rich Muslims states, being virtually their kith and kin, have the ultimate responsibility to feed them. This is the true import of the Arabic expression yat i man dha maqrabatin (lit. an orphan, near of kin). Again, it is pointed out in this verse that individuals or nations, who suffer through individual or national economic crises, must be helped to make them stand on their own feet. This scenario applies to many Third World countries whose economy is rapidly crumbling because timely, wide scale help is not provided. The third choice is au misk i nan dha matrabatin , which applies to such economies, as are reduced to dust and the entire economic system of the nation has collapsed. According to the Holy Quran, feeding the people in such countries is not enough. It is the responsibility of man to adopt measures to restore and rehabilitate their economies. Unfortunately, trade relations in this contemporary age represent the exact opposite. The flow of wealth is always in the direction of the richer and more advanced countries while the economies of poorer countries sink deeper in the red.