Waqf & Its Implications for the Modern Economy (Part 1)

https://islamicmarkets.com/articles/waqf-its-implications-modern-economy-part-1
Copy URL

In this series of articles on IslamicBanker.com, renowned economist Murat Çizakça explores Waqf - one of the greatest institutions in Islamic history and how it can be revitalised.

Pious foundations are known in the Islamic world as awqaf, boniyad or habs. Whereas the latter two terms are used primarily in Iran and North Africa respectively, the former is known, with slight variations, in the rest of the Islamic world. The word waqf and its plural form awqaf are derived from the Arabic root verb waqafa, which means causing a thing to stop and stand still. The second meaning is simply pious (charitable) foundations [1].

However defined, this institution, whereby a privately owned property, corpus, is endowed for a charitable purpose in p...