First part of an article published on Bitcoin Magazine Islamic finance is well-known as a world full of rules and prohibitions that seem strange and foreign to western scholars. Interest rates, excessive risk-taking, and investments in products deemed unethical such as wine, weapons, and pornography are strictly prohibited. In fact, every potential product to be invested in has to be approved by religious board members of Islamic banks. Bitcoin is no exception. Indeed, the financial climate around investing in Bitcoin is full of shadows in the Islamic world. No fatwa has been issued against the cryptocurrency, yet the final verdict on whether Muslims can invest in the cryptocurrency is still out. The bewildering array of legal systems scattered throughout the Muslim world doesn’t help, either. There are four fundamental legal schools practiced throughout Islamic countries — Hanafi, Hanbali, Shafi’i and Maliki — each with different approaches to nearly every aspect of Islamic law. Further, each country has its own legal system, connected in different degrees with Shariah. For example, the civil code in Egypt is mostly based on the Napoleonic Civil Code, but some branches of jurisprudence are influenced by Shariah, such as family law. By contrast, Saudi Arabia has a legal system completely Shariah-based, with great importance given to Hanbali’s ideas. So, is there any hope for the Islamic world climbing aboard the Bitcoin train? Fortunately, several aspects of the cryptocurrency may lend itself to approval by Islamic authorities. First, Bitcoin is not an inflationary currency like most others. Islamic law scholars have been disappointed by governments’ greedy use of inflation for decades, perhaps positing Bitcoin in a positive position for adoption. Shah Nawaz Khan, Retired Executive Director of State Life Insurance Corporation of Pakistan, has claimed that printing currency without any base is a modern kind of riba — one of the Several heinous sins that include murder, unlawfully taking orphans’ money and polytheism among others.