Is it permissible to use perfume if it is mixed with alcohol? Is it used as a purifier? Is it impure?

The questioner : Is it permissible to use perfume if it is mixed with alcohol, and to use alcohol as a purifier? Is it impure?

The Shaykh : We have mentioned this issue more than once, and we said: Perfumes that have something of alcohol mixed in them are looked at from two aspects: the first is in terms of their manufacture, and the other is in terms of their use. As for their manufacture, it is not permissible for us Muslims to make these perfumes and put alcohol in them; that is because the matter necessitates making wine and pressing wine, and you all know that this is among the forbidden things. There is the hadith that says: , in which it mentions among those mentioned the one who presses it, the one who is pressed by it, the one who sells it, the one who buys it, and so on. So the one who wants to make perfumes with alcohol, either he presses it or he buys it; so he is in contradiction with this explicit hadith. Therefore, it is forbidden for him to make these perfumes. As for the other aspect, in terms of use, if these perfumes come from outside the Islamic lands and are not made in the lands, and perhaps that is the reality; in that case, one should look into these perfumes. If the proportion of alcohol in them is much such that it makes this perfume intoxicating if a drinker were to drink it, as happens—unfortunately—in some Islamic lands when they lack intoxicating wine, they resort to using "cologne," for example, after mixing it with some water or other softeners. If the proportion of alcohol in this perfume—or cologne, as they call it today—makes this perfume intoxicating, then it is not permissible to perfume oneself with it.
Of this same category is "spiritus," with which our Muslim doctors are afflicted today. "Spiritus" is the mother of alcohol, as is well known; it is the origin of wine. So it is not permissible to make this alcohol, nor to sell it, nor to buy it, as we have mentioned. Therefore, it is obligatory upon Muslim doctors who are zealous for their religion to find a way out of this violation of the Shari'ah by finding an alternative for them among disinfectants and purifiers that suffice them from using the intoxicant. It should not be said: "They do not use it as an intoxicant." Because we say: We know that, but one of them must fall into a violation of the ten violations. One must buy, and the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) said: "Allah has cursed the buyer and the seller, and so on."
Therefore, my personal advice is to avoid using "cologne"; because it is not easy for us to place a scale for every person that enables him to know whether this cologne is intoxicating or not. If the proportion of alcohol is written on it, and this exists, as I have learned and been informed, in a large quantity, then the truth in it is clear, and it is prohibition. And if that is not mentioned, then the hadith of the Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him) comes here, and it is his saying: , and his saying: .
Other than that?

Another questioner : There is a question there... about a medicine, something like that.

The Shaykh : Yes, the ruling on medicine is the same as the ruling on perfume.
Yes.