About SparkIL
The Power of Interest-Free Loans
Our Mission
SparkIL combines Israel engagement and social impact through an innovative platform for social lending.
SparkIL is a peer-to-peer lending platform established jointly by The Jewish Agency for Israel and The Ogen Group. It enables investors from around the world to participate in crowdfunding interest-free loans which make a real, measurable, and continuing impact on underserved populations across Israel.
Our aim is to expand access of financial resources by providing funding to small businesses.
SparkIL serves all citizens of Israel. Our microloan borrowers often come from, or employ, marginalized social groups, and face challenges receiving the financial support needed for stability. Investments from the SparkIL community of lenders are often the steppingstones needed for these businesses to grow and succeed
The famous Talmudic passage כל ישראל ערבים זה לזה (kol Yisrael areivim ze laze) teaches that all Jewish people are responsible one for another. Despite our knack for disagreement, this value remains a cornerstone of Jewish Peoplehood.
Maimonides, the medieval philosopher and Torah scholar, famously and brilliantly outlined eight levels of charitable giving. The highest form is when a donor or lender empowers the recipient to become self-supporting. This is generally defined as giving someone a business loan or helping someone to find a job.
Within the granting of loans, Jewish tradition wisely understood the complicated dynamics that accompany the loaning of money with interest. The potential strains on a borrower and the risky allure of profit for lenders are the reasons for the Torah’s insightful instruction of Exodus 22:24, “If you lend money to My people…do not act toward them as a creditor; exact no interest from them.”
Providing interest-free loans is the pinnacle of helping others, and it is an expression of Jewish identity. In addition to elevating both the borrower and the lender, an interest-free loan is an actualization of Jewish values and fortifies Jewish Peoplehood.
SparkIL’s interest-free loans let you (and your friends!) make a real, measurable, and continuing impact on underserved populations across Israel – for the do-ers who need your support the most.