Chapter 2 begins with an overview of the great gap theory in economic history— believed to have existed from the time of the ancient Greeks to the European Renaissance— and surveys some of the major economic ideas in European scholasticism that are closely associated with al-Ghazālī's economic philosophy. This brief survey is crucial for understanding the position of power when it comes to affirming economic (and various other) fields within Islamic intellectual tradition that contemporary scholarship has often undervalued. Classical Muslim scholars, who have historically been underrepresented but have, in detail, analyzed economic thought from legal, theological, and ethical perspectives, not only devised a new genre and field of inquiry but also impacted the very understanding of the burgeoning economic science in the following centuries and influenced major trends in European scholasticism. This chapter then continues with the history of economic thought in Islamic tradition, explicating its key elements and propositions as an ethical human endeavor. The final section of this chapter addresses contemporary Islamic economics as a modern field that breaks apart from the classical economic scholarship in Islamic tradition in how it utilizes and defines economic subjectivity by in part following the modern division of sciences.

On Economic Gaps, Exchanges, and Scholasticism

Economic ideas predated Islam, especially those of the Greeks, who are considered the forefathers of what is today known as Western economic thought. In its early phase, according to Islahi, Islamic economic thought was not influenced by external elements, but primarily rested upon the teachings of the Qur’ān and Sunna. While this proposition can be taken with a grain of salt, simply because of various external factors and channels of influence from the ancient Near East on the Qur’ān that have also penetrated other fields such as Islamic philosophy, Islamic law, and even political thought, classical Muslim scholars devised a fully-fledged and detailed economic philosophy based on Sharī‘a's moral law, which was nonetheless often explicitly based on historical and social precedent. While the pre-Islamic era was known for its trade routes and economic relations and activities with other communities, a systematic theoretical and intellectual economic account did not exist; according to Islahi, scholars have found no evidence of foreign texts being translated into Arabic in that period, or of the application of foreign ideas as far as economic development is concerned.