The Ruling on Prizes in Academic Competitions
Machine translationRead the Arabic original
Question:
He says: Honorable Shaykh, may Allah grant you success. We are a group of young men, and each of us pays a specific amount equally to buy a book to be a prize for one of us if he wins an academic competition for memorizing texts. Is this permissible?
Answer:
Yes, this is permissible, if Allah wills. The academic competition for spreading knowledge and teaching knowledge falls under the category of jihad in the path of Allah, in His saying:Mishkat al-Masabih 3874 Because these are among the tools of jihad in the path of Allah, and learning knowledge is part of jihad in the path of Allah. So this is permissible, if Allah wills, as encouragement. Yes.
He says: Honorable Shaykh, may Allah grant you success. We are a group of young men, and each of us pays a specific amount equally to buy a book to be a prize for one of us if he wins an academic competition for memorizing texts. Is this permissible?
Answer:
Yes, this is permissible, if Allah wills. The academic competition for spreading knowledge and teaching knowledge falls under the category of jihad in the path of Allah, in His saying:
God’s Messenger as saying, “Wagers are allowed only for shooting arrows, or racing camels or horses.”
صلى الله عليه وسلم لا سبق إلا في نصل أو خف أو حافر
Source
قناة «العلامة الدكتور صالح الفوزان»، [568 -1024] حكم الجوائز في المسابقات العلمية - الشيخ صالح الفوزان — youtube.com
The Arabic text is a machine transcription of the audio recording.