Paying Zakah Through Loans to Facilitate Marriage
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Fatwa No. ( 20335 )
Praise be to Allah alone, and peace and blessings be upon the one after whom there is no prophet. And after that:
The Permanent Committee for Scholarly Research and Ifta has reviewed what was sent to His Eminence the Grand Mufti from the honorable head of the Al-Mubariz Grand Court and the head of the Marriage Facilitation Committee in Al-Ahsa , Shaykh: Abdullah ibn Abd al-Rahman al-Muhaysin , with number (592 \ 1) and date 22 / 2 / 1419 AH, and referred to the Committee by the General Secretariat of the Council of Senior Scholars, with number (2206) and date 24 / 3 / 1419 AH. His Excellency’s letter stated the following: We inform Your Eminence of the approval of His Highness the Governor of Al-Ahsa for the establishment of a committee to assist young people in getting married. This is one of the charitable committees in the Kingdom that provides financial assistance to young people wishing to marry, in the form of loans to be repaid or lump-sum grants given to them as charity or zakah. Based on Your Eminence’s fatwa permitting the distribution of zakah to those in need of marriage, the committee has received zakah from some benefactors. Since one of the forms of assistance the committee provides is giving loans that are recovered from the borrower, I hope that after Your Eminence has reviewed this, you will issue a fatwa for us: Is it permissible to lend to married couples from the zakah funds that reach the committee? Or should the zakah funds that reach the committee be distributed only to those in need, without a loan to be repaid? Please note that most of the funds reaching
the committee are from zakah.
After studying the inquiry, the Committee responded that zakah is paid to its rightful recipients, namely the poor, the needy, those in debt, and the other categories of zakah beneficiaries, by transferring ownership to them. It is obligatory to hasten in distributing it to its recipients to clear the obligations of its owners, as Allah the Exalted and His Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him) have commanded. It is not permissible to dispose of zakah funds by lending them to married couples or the like; because the purpose of zakah is to meet the needs of the poor and the needy and to pay off the debts of those in debt, and lending zakah funds deprives its recipients of these benefits or delays their benefit from them. And success is from Allah, and may Allah send prayers and blessings upon our Prophet Muhammad, his family, and his companions.
Praise be to Allah alone, and peace and blessings be upon the one after whom there is no prophet. And after that:
The Permanent Committee for Scholarly Research and Ifta has reviewed what was sent to His Eminence the Grand Mufti from the honorable head of the Al-Mubariz Grand Court and the head of the Marriage Facilitation Committee in Al-Ahsa , Shaykh: Abdullah ibn Abd al-Rahman al-Muhaysin , with number (592 \ 1) and date 22 / 2 / 1419 AH, and referred to the Committee by the General Secretariat of the Council of Senior Scholars, with number (2206) and date 24 / 3 / 1419 AH. His Excellency’s letter stated the following: We inform Your Eminence of the approval of His Highness the Governor of Al-Ahsa for the establishment of a committee to assist young people in getting married. This is one of the charitable committees in the Kingdom that provides financial assistance to young people wishing to marry, in the form of loans to be repaid or lump-sum grants given to them as charity or zakah. Based on Your Eminence’s fatwa permitting the distribution of zakah to those in need of marriage, the committee has received zakah from some benefactors. Since one of the forms of assistance the committee provides is giving loans that are recovered from the borrower, I hope that after Your Eminence has reviewed this, you will issue a fatwa for us: Is it permissible to lend to married couples from the zakah funds that reach the committee? Or should the zakah funds that reach the committee be distributed only to those in need, without a loan to be repaid? Please note that most of the funds reaching
the committee are from zakah.
After studying the inquiry, the Committee responded that zakah is paid to its rightful recipients, namely the poor, the needy, those in debt, and the other categories of zakah beneficiaries, by transferring ownership to them. It is obligatory to hasten in distributing it to its recipients to clear the obligations of its owners, as Allah the Exalted and His Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him) have commanded. It is not permissible to dispose of zakah funds by lending them to married couples or the like; because the purpose of zakah is to meet the needs of the poor and the needy and to pay off the debts of those in debt, and lending zakah funds deprives its recipients of these benefits or delays their benefit from them. And success is from Allah, and may Allah send prayers and blessings upon our Prophet Muhammad, his family, and his companions.
Source
www.alifta.gov.sa
The Arabic text is copied verbatim from the original source, without any edits.