Taking a loan with interest to repay a loan with interest Fatwa No: 88910
- Fatwa Date:22-11-2004
I am in need of taken out a loan to help my father. He has trouble with a loan he has taken out and paying a unbelievable amount of interest and is in trouble and worried that he will lose his house. If I take a loan out the interest I will be paying will be much less and the loan will be clear within 3 years. Whereas the loan my father has which is handled by a friend god only knows when he will clear it. I would love to help my father in this situation bearing in mind that I have no gain what so ever. Things will be a lot easier if we do this and we would save a lot of money going already on interest but the most important thing is that Allaah does not anger with us and we are not doing anything to displease him.
All perfect praise be to Allaah, The Lord of the Worlds. I testify that there is none worthy of worship except Allaah, and that Muhammad is His slave and Messenger. We ask Allaah to exalt his mention as well as that of his family and all his companions.
It is not permissible to get a loan with usury or interest in order to repay the debts of your father, as it is not permissible to deal with usury and/or interest except for a necessity. What you have mentioned about some of your father's money being confiscated does not make borrowing money with interest permissible. Your father has to seek forgiveness for getting this loan with interest as much as possible as this is one of the means of having his problems solved. It is good to supplicate with the advice of the Prophet : "O Allaah! Suffice me with what is lawful from resorting to that which is unlawful, and spare me by Your Grace of need of others." [At-Tirmithi and others] The debtor has to be patient about the anxiety and sorrow that he is experiencing and it is not permissible for him to resort to unlawful means in repaying his debts. A true believer is the one who becomes sad when he is indulged in what is unlawful, and not when he loses something of this worldly life or when he is afflicted in what he possesses in this life.
Allaah knows best.