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The OIC Fiqh Academy's settled ruling on inflation and debt — what a Muslim household actually does when money loses value.

The OIC Fiqh Academy's settled ruling on inflation and debt — what a Muslim household actually does when money loses value. The killer content is the line the whole corpus needs: you may NOT link a repayment to the cost-of-living index, gold, another currency or an interest rate at the time you take on a debt (that is riba by another name), but you MAY, as a precaution against inflation, agree from the outset to contract the debt itself in gold, silver, a stable currency or a basket — because then the borrower still repays exactly what he received. Salaries and long-lease rents are the one place indexation IS allowed. International Islamic Fiqh Academy (OIC), Resolution No. 115 (9/12), 'Inflation and the Changing Value of Currency', adopted at the 12th session (Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, 25 Jumādā al-Ākhirah – 1 Rajab 1421H / 23–28 September 2000).

What this source says

THE PRIMARY-SOURCE RULE FOR DEBT WHEN MONEY LOSES VALUE. Every household with a debt eventually meets the same worry: the money I borrowed is worth less by the time I repay it — is it fair, or even lawful, to adjust the repayment for inflation? Resolution No. 115 (9/12), adopted at the OIC Fiqh Academy's 12th session in Riyadh (25 Jumādā al-Ākhirah – 1 Rajab 1421H / 23–28 September 2000), is the Academy's settled answer. It is the single most load-bearing ruling in this corpus on inflation and debt, and its power is that it does not just say 'no' — it draws a precise line between a forbidden fix and a permitted one.

WHY THE ACADEMY RULED. The Council issued the resolution, in the official edition's own words, 'Having reviewed the final statement, recommendations, and suggestions of the Economic Fiqh Sympoisum on Inflation Issues (in its three sessions at Jeddah, Kuala Lumpur, and Manama)' and 'Having listened to the discussions of the Academy's members and experts and other scholars'. (The official PDF prints 'Sympoisum'; the IRTI edition renders the same body as 'the Fiqhi and Economic Seminar on Issues of Inflation'.) So this is not an off-the-cuff opinion: it distils three dedicated seminars on the fiqh and economics of inflation.

CLAUSE ONE — THE BASELINE: A DEBT IS REPAID IN ITS OWN KIND. The Academy first reconfirms its earlier Resolution No. 42 (4/5). Verbatim (official edition): 'The norm in the settlement of debt incurred in a specific currency is that it should be settled in the same (currency), rather than in value terms, for debts must be settled in an identical resource, and fixed debts, whatever their origin, are not permissible to be tied to the level of prices.' The IRTI edition renders the same rule differently: 'In principle debts that have already been created in terms of a certain currency should be repaid in terms of that same currency and not in terms of an equivalent value, because a debt has always to be settled with its exact similar. It is therefore impermissible to link the already existing debts, whatever their source might be, to price level.' The principle underneath is nominalism: 100 units borrowed is 100 units repaid. The currency's fall in real value between borrowing and repayment is not, of itself, a debt the borrower owes — and an EXISTING debt may not be re-tied to the price level after the fact.

CLAUSE TWO — THE PERMITTED PRECAUTION (THE GEM). Here is the constructive half most people miss. Verbatim (official): 'It is permissible for both parties, and as a precautionary measure against an expected inflation, to make the debt in terms of a medium other than the currency that will decline in value.' The debt can then be contracted in one of five things: (A) gold or silver, (B) a homogeneous commodity, (C) a homogeneous commodities basket, (D) another more stable currency, (E) a currency basket. Crucially: 'The amount repaid in the above forms should be exactly similar to the original debt (concerning the amount and type of currency), as the borrower should be indebted with no more than what he has received actually.' The Academy then draws the line explicitly: 'The aformentioned forms differ totally from the prohibited arrangement in which the two parties first specify the debt amount in a certain currency, and then agree that the settlement would be made in another stable currency or basket of currencies (indexation). This latter arrangement has been strictly prohibited by the Academy resolution no. 75 (6/8) pararagraph (4).' (The official PDF prints 'aformentioned' and 'pararagraph'; the IRTI edition reads 'The above stated forms' and cites 'Resolution No. 75 (6/8 — Fourthly)'.) The distinction is the whole ruling: you may DENOMINATE the debt in a stable store of value FROM THE OUTSET (so what is owed was genuinely lent in that unit), but you may NOT price the loan in one currency and then bolt on an index at repayment time.

CLAUSE THREE — THE PROHIBITION: DO NOT INDEX THE REPAYMENT. Verbatim (official): 'It is not permissible in Shariah, at the time of concluding the debt contract, to link the repayable amount to any of the following cases' — and it lists eight: (A) an accounting currency, (B) a cost-of-living index or any other index, (C) gold or silver, (D) the price of a specific commodity, (E) growth rate of the Gross National Product (GNP), (F) another currency, (G) interest rate, (H) the price of a commodities basket. The reason is stated plainly: 'Indexation in this way is prohibited because it involves a great deal of Gharar and Jahālah (uncertainty and lack of information) since both parties will not be able to know what the commitment will be at the end.' And the punchline that anchors this into the riba corpus: 'If the indicator used for indexation happens to show an increase, this will lead to discrepancy between the original debt amount and the amount to be repaid i.e. commitment of usury.' Note carefully that gold, silver and another currency appear in BOTH clause two (permitted) and clause three (prohibited) — the difference is not the unit but the TIMING and mechanism: contracting the debt in gold up front is lawful; keeping the debt in dollars and topping it up by the gold price at repayment is the prohibited indexation that becomes usury on any increase.

CLAUSE FOUR — WHERE INDEXATION IS ALLOWED: SALARIES AND RENTS. The Academy is careful not to over-reach. Verbatim (official): 'Confirming the Academy resolution no. 75 (6/8) clause no. 1, which stipulates the permissibility of indexing salaries according to the change in the price rate.' And for leases: it is permissible, in a long-period property lease, to fix the first period's rent and then agree to index future periods to an indicator, 'provided that the rent amount becomes known at the beginning of every period.' The line that separates this from the forbidden case is knowability: a wage or a future rent period is a fresh exchange whose amount is settled BEFORE that period begins, so there is no gharar — unlike a debt, whose amount is already fixed and would be retrospectively inflated.

THE GEM, STATED ONCE MORE. The single most useful sentence to carry from Resolution 115: indexing a DEBT to inflation is riba; denominating the debt itself in a stable store of value from the start is not. A riba-free household that fears its lending or borrowing will be eroded by inflation has ONE lawful lever the Academy names — agree the debt in gold, silver, a stable currency or a basket at the moment of contracting, so the borrower repays exactly what he received in that same unit — and one forbidden lever it bans — a cost-of-living, gold-price, currency or interest-rate adjustment applied to a debt already struck in local currency.

HOW A HOUSEHOLD ACTUALLY USES THIS. (a) A qard (loan) between family or friends is repaid in the same amount and currency it was given — the lender bears the inflation, and asking for 'a bit more to cover inflation' on a dollar loan is the very 'commitment of usury' clause three names (Clause 1, Clause 3). (b) If you genuinely want to protect a loan against an expected currency collapse, the lawful route is to LEND in the stable unit itself — e.g. lend and be repaid in grams of gold, or in a harder currency — agreed at the outset, with repayment 'exactly similar' to what was advanced (Clause 2). (c) Do NOT accept or offer a debt whose repayment is pegged to CPI, the gold price, an FX rate, GNP or an interest rate — that peg is prohibited regardless of how it is dressed up (Clause 3). (d) Employment and long leases are different: a salary or a multi-year rent MAY be indexed to a price indicator, provided each period's figure is known before that period starts (Clause 4). (e) When comparing 'Islamic' financing that quietly re-prices instalments to an index or benchmark rate, this resolution is the primary-source test: a benchmark peg on a fixed debt is exactly what clause three forbids.

WHERE THIS SITS IN THE CORPUS. Resolution 115 is a riba ruling at its core — its clause three explicitly names indexation-on-increase as 'commitment of usury' — but it also leans on the gharar/jahālah (excessive uncertainty) principle to explain WHY, so it bridges the corpus's riba fabric and its integrity-of-contract fabric. It reconfirms and operationalises Resolution No. 42 (4/5) on currency-value change (already in this corpus) and Resolution No. 75 (6/8) on indexation, turning their principles into a concrete household rule. It is the natural companion to the corpus's entries on organised tawarruq and penalty clauses: all three are cases where a modern financial technique reintroduces riba through a side door, and the Academy shuts it.

GENUINE DIFFERENCES BETWEEN THE TWO EDITIONS (disclosed, not smoothed). The two translations agree on every operative point while differing in wording, and each carries its own print slips. SESSION DATE: official '25 Jumādā al-Ākhirah – 1 Rajab 1421h (23–28 September 2000)' versus IRTI '25th of Jumad Thani to 1st of Rajab 1421 H (23 — 28/9/2000)' — Jumādā al-Ākhirah and Jumad Thani are the SAME sixth Islamic month under two transliterations, and the Gregorian dates are identical; no real divergence. SEMINAR NAME: official 'the Economic Fiqh Sympoisum on Inflation Issues' versus IRTI 'the Fiqhi and Economic Seminar on Issues of Inflation' — a genuine wording difference; the official 'Sympoisum' is a print slip for 'Symposium', flagged not corrected. CLAUSE 1 (the Res 42 quote): official 'The norm in the settlement of debt incurred in a specific currency…' versus IRTI 'In principle debts that have already been created in terms of a certain currency…' — two genuinely different translations of the same reconfirmed text. CLAUSE 2 LEAD: official 'a medium other than the currency that will decline in value' versus IRTI 'a means other than the currency that will encounter a fall in value'. THE FIVE FORMS: official 'A homogeneous commodities basket' / 'Currency basket' versus IRTI 'A basket of homogeneous commodities' / 'A basket of currencies' (same items, inverted phrasing). CLAUSE 2 CONTRAST: official 'The aformentioned forms' (print slip for 'aforementioned') versus IRTI 'The above stated forms'; official 'This latter arrangement' versus IRTI 'This later arrangement' (IRTI print slip 'later' for 'latter'); the Res-75 cross-reference is official 'resolution no. 75 (6/8) pararagraph (4)' (print slip 'pararagraph') versus IRTI 'Resolution No. 75 (6/8 — Fourthly)'. CLAUSE 3 LIST: official 'The price of a specific commodity' / 'The price of a commodities basket' versus IRTI 'The price of a certain commodity' / 'Price of a basket of commodities'. CLAUSE 3 REASON: official spells 'Jahālah' with the long ā, IRTI 'Jahalah'; the usury line is official 'i.e. commitment of usury' versus IRTI 'i. e. to commitment of usury'. CLAUSE 4: official 'Confirming the Academy resolution no. 75 (6/8) clause no. 1… indexing salaries according to the change in the price rate' versus IRTI 'Reconfirmation of Resolution No. 75 (6/8) Clause: Firstly… indexation of salaries according to change in the price level'; and official 'provided that the rent amount becomes known at the beginning of every period' versus IRTI 'provided that the rent amount will become known at the beginning of every period'. Every verbatim quote used above was machine-checked against both source PDFs (31/31 OK).

AN HONEST NOTE ON WHAT IS AND IS NOT HERE. This is a settled operative ruling (four decisive Resolves clauses plus a long list of policy recommendations to governments and central banks), not a deferral. The four clauses above are the resolution's own words; the 'denominate-yes, index-no' gem and the mapping onto family loans, gold-denominated lending and benchmark-pegged instalments are plain restatements of clauses two, three and four, not inferences bolted on by this site. The recommendations section (calls to curb monetary expansion, avoid inflationary and usurious government financing, study a return to some gold link, and protect depositors) is genuine but addressed to states and institutions rather than households, so it is summarised, not quoted line by line. The resolution's text cites no Qur'an verse and no hadith number — it reasons from the fiqh of debt (nominalism), gharar and the definition of riba — records no madhab tally and no vote count, and names no bank, product, figure or rate, so none is reported here. The cross-links to Resolutions 42 and 75, to organised tawarruq and to the gharar principle are the corpus's own commentary on where this ruling sits, not additional clauses of Resolution 115.

Wording inside quotation marks is quoted from the source. The rest is this notebook’s summary of it — read the original before relying on it.

Provenance

Compiled from: Compiled from TWO genuinely different English translations of the SAME primary resolution, cross-read 2026-07-13, every load-bearing quote machine-verified verbatim against both source PDFs (line-wrap, hyphenation, inserted-page-number and diacritic aware, whitespace-normalised, 31/31 OK): [1] the INTERNATIONAL ISLAMIC FIQH ACADEMY (OIC) OFFICIAL ENGLISH EDITION, 'Resolutions and Recommendations of the International Islamic Fiqh Academy' (official edition, October 2021), printing it as 'Resolution No. 115 (9/12) / Inflation and the Changing Value of Currency'; and [2] the IRTI/IDB PRINTED EDITION, 'Resolutions and Recommendations of the Council of the Islamic Fiqh Academy 1985-2000' (Islamic Research and Training Institute, Islamic Development Bank, Jeddah), printing it as 'Resolution No. 115(9/12) / On "Inflation and Change of Currency Value"'. Both editions carry the same 12th session (Riyadh, 23–28 September 2000) and the same four operative Resolves clauses plus the recommendations. This is a SETTLED operative ruling, not a deferral. The load-bearing content is the four clauses: (First) reconfirmation of Resolution No. 42 (4/5) — a debt in a given currency is settled in that same currency, not in value terms, and existing debts may not be tied to the price level; (Second, the constructive permission) as a precaution against expected inflation, the two parties MAY contract the debt from the outset in gold or silver, a homogeneous commodity or basket, a more stable currency or a currency basket, provided the amount repaid is exactly similar to what was received — expressly distinguished from the prohibited indexation banned by Resolution No. 75 (6/8); (Third, the prohibition) it is impermissible, at the time of concluding the debt, to link the repayable amount to an accounting currency, a cost-of-living or any other index, gold or silver, the price of a commodity, GNP growth, another currency, an interest rate, or a basket of commodities — because it is Gharar and Jahālah and, on an increase, 'commitment of usury'; (Fourth) indexation of salaries and of long-period lease rents IS permissible, reconfirming Resolution No. 75 (6/8), provided the rent becomes known at the start of each period. The resolution cites no Qur'an verse and no hadith number, records no madhab tally and no vote count, and names no bank, product, figure or rate.
Source: PRIMARY TEXT (full title; session/city/date; the four operative Resolves clauses in full — (First) the reconfirmation of Resolution No. 42 (4/5) that a debt is settled in its own currency and amount and existing debts may not be tied to the price level, (Second) the permission to contract a debt from the outset in gold/silver, a homogeneous commodity or basket, a more stable currency or a currency basket with repayment 'exactly similar' to what was received, expressly distinguished from the indexation prohibited by Resolution No. 75 (6/8), (Third) the prohibition on linking a repayable amount at contracting time to an accounting currency, any index, gold/silver, a commodity price, GNP growth, another currency, an interest rate or a commodities basket — as gharar/jahālah and, on increase, 'commitment of usury', and (Fourth) the permissibility of indexing salaries and long-period lease rents provided each period's amount is known in advance — plus the policy recommendations) from [1] the INTERNATIONAL ISLAMIC FIQH ACADEMY (OIC) OFFICIAL ENGLISH EDITION, 'Resolutions and Recommendations of the International Islamic Fiqh Academy' (official edition, October 2021), printing it as 'Resolution No. 115 (9/12) / Inflation and the Changing Value of Currency' (12th session, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, 23–28 September 2000) — extracted verbatim from the published PDF (https://iifa-aifi.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/Resolutions-Recommendations-of-the-IIFA-Official-Edition-Oct-2021.pdf), read 2026-07-13. CONFIRMING SECOND, GENUINELY DIFFERENT TRANSLATION from [2] the IRTI/IDB PRINTED EDITION, 'Resolutions and Recommendations of the Council of the Islamic Fiqh Academy 1985-2000' (Islamic Research and Training Institute, Islamic Development Bank, Jeddah), printing it as 'Resolution No. 115(9/12) / On "Inflation and Change of Currency Value"', same 12th session, same four clauses — extracted verbatim from the published PDF (https://zulkiflihasan.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/12/majma-fiqh.pdf), read 2026-07-13. THE TWO EDITIONS ARE GENUINELY DIFFERENT RENDERINGS that converge on the same operative content; genuine differences reported rather than smoothed: SESSION DATE ('Jumādā al-Ākhirah' vs 'Jumad Thani' — the SAME sixth month, identical Gregorian dates, no real divergence); SEMINAR NAME ('Economic Fiqh Sympoisum on Inflation Issues' vs 'Fiqhi and Economic Seminar on Issues of Inflation' — the official 'Sympoisum' a print slip for 'Symposium', flagged not corrected); CLAUSE 1 the Res 42 reconfirmation quoted in two different translations ('The norm in the settlement of debt…' vs 'In principle debts that have already been created…'); CLAUSE 2 ('a medium other than the currency that will decline in value' vs 'a means other than the currency that will encounter a fall in value'; the five forms 'A homogeneous commodities basket'/'Currency basket' vs 'A basket of homogeneous commodities'/'A basket of currencies'; 'The aformentioned forms' [print slip] vs 'The above stated forms'; 'This latter arrangement' vs 'This later arrangement' [IRTI print slip]; the Res-75 cross-reference 'no. 75 (6/8) pararagraph (4)' [print slip] vs 'No. 75 (6/8 — Fourthly)'); CLAUSE 3 (list items 'a specific commodity'/'a commodities basket' vs 'a certain commodity'/'a basket of commodities'; 'Jahālah' vs 'Jahalah'; 'i.e. commitment of usury' vs 'i. e. to commitment of usury'); CLAUSE 4 ('Confirming… clause no. 1… according to the change in the price rate' vs 'Reconfirmation… Clause: Firstly… according to change in the price level'; 'the rent amount becomes known' vs 'the rent amount will become known'). Every verbatim quote used above was machine-checked against both source PDFs (line-wrap, hyphenation, inserted-page-number and diacritic aware, whitespace-normalised, 31/31 OK). Trust: high (two independent verbatim primary editions of the same OIC resolution).
School / basis: Comparative / transactional-law with a PRIMARY OIC collective-ijtihad text. Resolution No. 115 (9/12), 12th session (Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, 25 Jumādā al-Ākhirah – 1 Rajab 1421H / 23–28 September 2000), is the Academy's SETTLED ruling on inflation and the changing value of currency as it bears on debt. Four operative Resolves clauses: (First) reconfirming Resolution No. 42 (4/5) — a monetary debt is settled in its own currency and amount, not in value terms, and existing debts may not be tied to the price level (nominalism); (Second, the constructive permission) as a precaution against expected inflation the two parties MAY contract the debt itself, from the outset, in gold or silver, a homogeneous commodity or basket, a more stable currency or a currency basket, provided the amount repaid is exactly similar to what was received — expressly distinguished from the indexation prohibited by Resolution No. 75 (6/8); (Third, the prohibition) it is impermissible, at the time of concluding the debt, to link the repayable amount to an accounting currency, any price/cost-of-living index, gold or silver, a commodity price, GNP growth, another currency, an interest rate or a commodities basket — because it is gharar and jahālah and, on any increase, 'commitment of usury'; (Fourth) indexation of salaries and of long-period lease rents IS permissible (reconfirming Res 75), provided each period's amount becomes known before that period begins. The decisive gem is the line between clause two and clause three: gold, silver and other currencies appear in both, so the distinction is not the unit but the timing and mechanism — denominating the debt in a stable store of value up front is lawful; pegging a local-currency debt to an index or benchmark at repayment is the prohibited indexation that becomes riba. This is a riba ruling that also leans on the gharar principle; it reconfirms Res 42 and Res 75, and sits with the corpus's tawarruq and penalty-clause entries as a case of a modern technique reintroducing riba through a side door. Res 115 cites no Qur'an verse, no hadith number, no madhab count and no vote, so none is reported here; it names no bank, product, figure or rate.
Original: https://iifa-aifi.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/Resolutions-Recommendations-of-the-IIFA-Official-Edition-Oct-2021.pdf
Captured: 2026-07-13
Added: 2026-07-13
Trust: Primary or near-primary source with a stable public URL.

Compiler’s note

Added 2026-07-13 (auto-run). The OIC Fiqh Academy's SETTLED ruling on inflation and debt — Res 115 (9/12), 12th session, Riyadh, 25 Jumādā al-Ākhirah – 1 Rajab 1421H / 23–28 September 2000 — taken as a ḍamān/wakālah-adjacent NEXT-candidate slot but chosen instead because inflation-and-debt is a more everyday household question and this is the corpus's most load-bearing primary source on it (returns to the riba/finance cluster, reconfirming Res 42 (4/5) and Res 75 (6/8), both cross-referenced). KILLER GEM (Clauses 2 vs 3, verbatim official): you may NOT, at contracting time, link a repayment to a cost-of-living index, gold/silver, a commodity price, GNP, another currency, an interest rate or a commodities basket — 'Indexation in this way is prohibited because it involves a great deal of Gharar and Jahālah… commitment of usury' — but you MAY, 'as a precautionary measure against an expected inflation, make the debt in terms of a medium other than the currency that will decline in value' (gold/silver, a homogeneous commodity or basket, a stable currency or currency basket), 'exactly similar to the original debt'. The distinction is timing/mechanism, not the unit (gold appears in BOTH lists): denominate up front = lawful; index a struck debt = riba. GEM 2 (Clause 1): reconfirms Res 42 nominalism — a debt is repaid in its own currency and amount, existing debts may not be tied to the price level. GEM 3 (Clause 4): salaries and long-lease rents ARE indexable (reconfirming Res 75) provided each period's amount is known before it starts. GOLD-STANDARD pairing: two genuinely different English editions cross-read — the Academy's OWN OFFICIAL ENGLISH EDITION (Oct 2021 PDF) + the IRTI/IDB printed edition (1985-2000, which carries this 12th-session/2000 resolution, so the pairing holds), both pdftotext-verbatim. Genuine divergences reported not smoothed: session month 'Jumādā al-Ākhirah' vs 'Jumad Thani' (SAME 6th month, identical Gregorian, no real divergence); seminar name 'Economic Fiqh Sympoisum' [official print slip for 'Symposium'] vs 'Fiqhi and Economic Seminar'; Clause 1 two different translations of the Res 42 quote; Clause 2 'a medium… that will decline in value' vs 'a means… that will encounter a fall in value', the five forms 'commodities basket'/'Currency basket' vs 'basket of… commodities'/'basket of currencies', 'aformentioned' [official slip] vs 'above stated', 'latter' vs 'later' [IRTI slip], Res-75 ref 'pararagraph (4)' [official slip] vs '(6/8 — Fourthly)'; Clause 3 'specific/commodities basket' vs 'certain/basket of commodities', 'Jahālah' vs 'Jahalah', 'i.e.' vs 'i. e. to'; Clause 4 'clause no. 1… price rate' vs 'Clause: Firstly… price level', 'becomes known' vs 'will become known'. All 31 load-bearing quotes machine-verified against both source PDFs (31/31 OK, whitespace/hyphenation/inserted-page-number/diacritic aware). HONESTY built in: the four clauses are the resolution's own words; the 'denominate-yes, index-no' gem and the mapping onto family loans, gold-denominated lending and benchmark-pegged instalments are plain restatements of Clauses 2–4; the recommendations (to states/central banks) are summarised not quoted line by line. DROPPED per no-fab: Qur'an verse / hadith number (Res 115 cites none — it reasons from nominalism, gharar and the definition of riba); madhab tally; vote count; any bank/product/figure/rate. Articles 95->96. Clean `rm -rf .next && npm run build` green; `npm run lint` = 0/0. NEXT candidate (substantive finance/muamalat ruling, in BOTH editions i.e. ≤2000/≤12th session, not a deferral, not yet covered): Res 107 (1/12) 'Delivery and Tendering Contracts' (a ḍamān/procurement neighbour), or a wakālah (agency) ruling; AVOID Res 89 currency (near-duplicate of Res 42) and the known deferrals Res 22/45/77/78/87/96.

Topics

islamic-financefiqh-of-transactionsmuamalatribausuryinterestinflationdebtdebt-indexationindexationcost-of-living-indexcpicurrencycurrency-valuedevaluationnominalismgoldsilvergold-standardstable-currencycurrency-basketcommodity-basketqardloanlendingrepaymentsettlement-of-debtghararjahalahuncertaintysalary-indexationwage-indexationrent-indexationijarahleasingbenchmark-rateinterest-rate-benchmarkmonetary-policycentral-bankresolution-42resolution-75oicinternational-islamic-fiqh-academyiifaresolution-115res-115115-9-1212th-sessionriyadh2000primary-sourcecollective-ijtihadsettled-ruling

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