The fact that the results of zakat mal (alms upon wealth) of Muslims are collected could be used to prosper all the poor in this world and might even be able to pay off civilization debts. However, it has not been supported yet by the existence of syariah (Islamic) economy focusing on BC calendar as the center.
In fact, if the Islamic economy concerns with hijri calendar calculation, more than 83 million dollars of zakat mal from 10 million Muslims would have be gained in nine and half years. Nevertheless, the absence of Islamic calendar as the standard to count haul (a full year) of zakat hampers the distribution.
It is the point of a discussion and book review entitled “Pseudo Syariah Economy and Muslims Civilization” on Saturday (1/11) in hall room of AR. Fachruddin A, the fifth floor of UMY. The book written by Prof. Dr. Tono Saksono has been started from his research on Islamic calendar since 2006. Through this book, he encouraged the care of Islamic scholars, lecturers, and doctors to alleviate poverty by holding on the use of Islamic calendar as the basis of Muslims’ business accounting. To date, the discussion of syariah economy still focuses on three aspects which are riba (interest), masyir (gambling factors), and gharar (illegitimate factors in business).
According to Prof. Tono, a professor of Husein Onn University, Malaysia, syariah economic system, particularly Islamic banking field, needed to employ Islamic calendar to determine haul of zakat of the customers. He argued that the calculation of BC calendar and Islamic calendar was different. “The calculation of Islamic calendar is 11-day-shorter than BC calendar. If the zakat is paid based on BC calendar, it will be disbursed after the haul of 365 days. On the other hand, if it is used Islamic calendar, the 354th day is the time of haul and paying the zakat. Thus, if it is centered on BC calendar, there will be certain time which cannot be calculated for the haul,” he explained.
He provided an example that if 10 million Muslims had assets of holdings in a bank for 9.5 years, the calculation of the zakat would be different. “For instance, 10 million Muslims have assets of holdings in a bank for 9.5 years, based on BC calendar the zakat would be 81 million dollars. But, if it is counted by using Islamic calendar, the zakat would be 83 million dollars. Hence, the difference of 2 million dollars is not calculated,” he stated.
Nevertheless, this Indonesian-descent professor deemed that Muslims has not been care of Islamic calendar yet. It is proven by a lot of differences to establish the beginning of hijri month, such as deciding the beginning of Ramadhan, Syawal, and even 9 and 10 Dzulhijjah. “As the result, it has not been a trusted Islamic calendar yet. Therefore, if we are willing to pay off the debts of this civilization which has been more than 40 year-old, we have to turn Islamic calendar as the main center of syariah economy,” he conveyed. (Sakinah)
