Journal of Tax Research

Taxes are not only the best revenue sources for government but also the most important devised tools in Iran’s 20- year vision plan, the development and resistance economy programs. So, the tax laws have been reviewed and reformed to alternate oil revenues with taxes, but tax penalties, their compatibility with Islamic sharia (Islamic Law) and efficiency have been neglected in this trend. As every law must have legality, we will study Islamic legality of these penalties, after that we will indicate the right orientation of the penalties. Our studies show that tax is a kind of debts (not a legal order), and so the penalty for the payment delay is illegal because of Reba. In the other hand, Islamic punishment has reprimand aspect typically rather than financial aspects. We need to know the target populations in the tax system, so punishment of the disobeyed people has not necessary effectiveness and compatibility. Finally non-financial punishments have enough effectiveness for meeting the goals in addition to their compatibility with Islamic sharia.