Perfumes Containing Alcohol and the Criterion for Their Impurity

The questioner:
Honorable Shaykh, may Allah preserve you, you mentioned that khamr (intoxicants) is najasah (ritually impure) according to the correct view. Does this mean that perfumes containing alcohol are impure? And if the alcohol has the property of evaporating immediately, so that nothing remains when a person uses it? Also, what about perfumes that contain very little alcohol? What is the correct path?

The Shaykh:
The correct path is that if these perfumes would intoxicate if drunk, they are impure because they are khamr. If they would intoxicate if drunk, they are khamr and impure. But if they would not intoxicate if drunk, they are not impure. The criterion is intoxication; the criterion is intoxication, based on the saying of the Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him) . The criterion is intoxication. There are types of perfumes used for intoxication; these are haram (forbidden) and impure. And there are perfumes that do not intoxicate; these are not impure; they are permissible and pleasant.

The questioner:
May Allah keep you.

The Shaykh:
Some people say that nowadays there are types of perfume that the fasiq (open sinners) use to get drunk; they drink them. There is no doubt about them, yes.

The questioner:
The perfumes they make, we do not know about them whether they intoxicate or not.

The Shaykh:
Yes, the Imam knows that the original state is purity; the original state is purity, praise be to Allah. But previously, there were fatwas (scholarly legal rulings) from the scholars of knowledge when cologne appeared. They analyzed it and found that it intoxicates, so they ruled that it is impure. Cologne is a type of perfume. The result is that the criterion is intoxication: whatever of these perfumes intoxicates if drunk is impure, and whatever does not intoxicate is not impure, yes.

Another questioner:
If the cologne evaporates, does it count? If a person applies the perfume and it evaporates, it evaporates immediately. Does this count or not?

The Shaykh:
The scent remains.

Another questioner:
The scent of this time remains.

The Shaykh:
No, the scent. They say that as long as there is a scent in it, a trace, this is the scent of the impure perfume. If it intoxicates, if this that is sprayed intoxicates, then as long as its scent is present, it is impure.