In finance and economics, interest is payment from a debtor or deposit-taking financial institution to a lender or depositor of an amount above repayment of the principal sum, at a particular rate. It is distinct from a fee which the borrower may pay to the lender or some third party. It is also distinct from dividend which is paid by a company to its shareholders (owners) from its profit or reserve, but not at a particular rate decided beforehand, rather on a pro rata basis as a share in the reward gained by risk taking entrepreneurs when the revenue earned exceeds the total costs.
Usury is the practice of making loans that are seen as unfairly enriching the lender. The term may be used in a moral sense—condemning taking advantage of others' misfortunes—or in a legal sense, where an interest rate is charged in excess of the maximum rate that is allowed by law. A loan may be considered usurious because of excessive or abusive interest rates or other factors defined by the laws of a state. Someone who practices usury can be called a usurer, but in modern colloquial English may be called a loan shark.
A bank account is a financial account maintained by a bank or other financial institution in which the financial transactions between the bank and a customer are recorded. Each financial institution sets the terms and conditions for each type of account it offers, which are classified in commonly understood types, such as deposit accounts, credit card accounts, current accounts, loan accounts or many other types of account. A customer may have more than one account. Once an account is opened, funds entrusted by the customer to the financial institution on deposit are recorded in the account designated by the customer. Funds can be withdrawn from the accounts.
Monetary reform is any movement or theory that proposes a system of supplying money and financing the economy that is different from the current system.
Tzedakah is a Hebrew word meaning "righteousness", but commonly used to signify charity. This concept of "charity" differs from the modern Western understanding of "charity". The latter is typically understood as a spontaneous act of goodwill and a marker of generosity; tzedakah is an ethical obligation, and it is not properly "charity", like in Christendom, but a way to empower poor people to support themselves, helping them in developing their talents and skills.
Jacob Henry Schiff was an American banker, businessman, and philanthropist. He helped finance the expansion of American railroads and the Japanese military efforts against Tsarist Russia in the Russo-Japanese War.
Zarphatic, also called Judeo-French or Western Loez, is an extinct Jewish language that was spoken by the French Jews of northern France and in parts of west-central Germany, such as Mainz, Frankfurt am Main and Aix-la-Chapelle. It was also spoken by French Jews who moved to Norman England. Some have conjectured that the language influenced the development of Yiddish.
The roots of verbs and most nouns in the Semitic languages are characterized as a sequence of consonants or "radicals". Such abstract consonantal roots are used in the formation of actual words by adding the vowels and non-root consonants which go with a particular morphological category around the root consonants, in an appropriate way, generally following specific patterns. It is a peculiarity of Semitic linguistics that a large majority of these consonantal roots are triliterals.
Isidore Singer was an American encyclopedist and editor of The Jewish Encyclopedia and founder of the American League for the Rights of Man.
The subject of loans and interest in Judaism has a long and complex history. In the Hebrew Bible, the Book of Ezekiel classifies the charging of interest among the worst sins, denouncing it as an abomination and metaphorically portraying usurers as people who have shed the borrower's blood. The Talmud dwells on Ezekiel's condemnation of charging interest.
Gemach is a Jewish free-loan fund that subscribes to both the positive Torah commandment of lending money and the Torah prohibition against charging interest on a personal loan to a fellow Jew. Unlike bank loans, gemach loans are interest-free, and are often set up with easy repayment terms.
A bank is a financial institution that accepts deposits from the public and creates a demand deposit while simultaneously making loans. Lending activities can be directly performed by the bank or indirectly through capital markets.
The International Association of Hebrew Free Loans (IAHFL) is an umbrella organization for Hebrew Free Loan societies, organizations that offer interest-free loans to Jews. There are members around the world, with most in North America. Each member organization has its own rules regarding such things as who may borrow, the maximum loan amount, and the repayment process. However, all offer loans without interest.
The Hebrew Free Loan Society of Greater Philadelphia (HFLGP) provides interest-free loans to members of the Philadelphia Jewish community in need. Founded in 1984 as the Hebrew Free Loan Society at Beth Sholom and housed at Beth Sholom Congregation, by 2006, over $2 million in loans had been granted from its revolving fund. HFLGP is a member of the International Association of Hebrew Free Loans.
The Zeitgeist Movement is an activist movement established in the United States in 2008 by Peter Joseph. The group is critical of market capitalism, describing it as structurally corrupt and wasteful of resources. The group dismisses historic religious concepts as misleading, and embraces sustainable ecology and scientific administration of society. VC Reporter's Shane Cohn summarized the movement's charter as: "Our greatest social problems are the direct results of our economic system".
Don Patinkin was an American-born Israeli monetary economist, and the President of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
Monetary circuit theory is a heterodox theory of monetary economics, particularly money creation, often associated with the post-Keynesian school. It holds that money is created endogenously by the banking sector, rather than exogenously by central bank lending; it is a theory of endogenous money. It is also called circuitism and the circulation approach.
Hebrew Free Loan Association of Northeast Ohio (HFLA) is an American non-sectarian 501(c)(3) non-profit organization that loans money interest-free to people who do not have easy access to other capital.
Shylock is a fictional character in William Shakespeare's play The Merchant of Venice. A Venetian Jewish moneylender, Shylock is the play's principal villain. His defeat and conversion to Christianity form the climax of the story.
Judeo-Urdu was a dialect of the Hindustani language spoken by the Baghdadi Jews in the Indian subcontinent living in the areas of Mumbai and Kolkata towards the end of the 18th century. It is a dialect that was written in the Hebrew script and found to be used for several pieces of literature, such as Inder Sabha, a copy of which is kept at the British Library.
