What is the ruling on using soap made from pig fat? The Shaykh also spoke about the ruling on cologne and medicines containing alcohol.

The questioner : ... All of this has changed from its original state, and its composition has completely changed in the soap material. But did it not begin with this new material from something that was originally forbidden?

The Shaykh : Of course.

The questioner : Therefore, does what resulted from it not take the same ruling?

The Shaykh : This is the evidence I wanted to clarify earlier. Recently, a question was directed to me regarding cologne, which is alcohol. What is the ruling on using it? My narration and answer proceeded to medicines, which rarely are free of alcohol. I concluded with the ruling on cologne and these medical drinks as follows: Relying on his saying (peace and blessings be upon him) This cologne or this medicinal drink, if the proportion of alcohol in it makes the amount that a person can consume of it—whether healthy or sick, healthy in the case of cologne, for example, if mixed with some water or anything else, and the sick person if he drinks a lot of that medicine—does not intoxicate and is not affected, then in that case, it is permissible to sell, buy, and use that cologne, and likewise that medicine or drink. But if the large amount of both the cologne and the drink intoxicates the drinker, then in that case, it is not permissible to sell or buy it, nor to use it. After this, I came to what we are currently discussing. But this does not mean that it is permissible for a Muslim to manufacture cologne with his own hand, even if the proportion of alcohol in it is small. Nor does it mean that it is permissible for a Muslim pharmacist to compound a medicine containing alcohol, even in small proportions. Because this entails, first: where does he get this alcohol? Either he distills it himself or he buys it ready-made. This is not permissible, and that is not permissible, as is in the hadith This is what I want to say now. This cologne and these medicines, when they come to us ready-made from Europe, we look at them from the previous perspective: does the large amount intoxicate or not? And the answer is known. But this does not mean that it is permissible for us to manufacture as they do, because this manufacture requires us, in that case, to fall into the forbidden explicitly. Either we distill with our own hands, or we distill, or we buy what others have distilled. All of this falls under the generality of his saying (peace and blessings be upon him): If this has become clear to you, we return to the soap. The soap is like the medicine made by the disbelievers and like the cologne made by the disbelievers. We look at this result and study it in light of the Islamic Shari'ah and give it the appropriate ruling, as explained earlier. But when we want to manufacture as they did, it is not permissible for us to manufacture as they did, because we would be committing a violation of the Shari'ah here. I think the answer is clear to you. They took pig fat or the fat of a dead animal and introduced it as an element, whether in cheese or in soap. This is not a sin after disbelief; this is their work. So this result or this compound, we studied it in light of the Islamic Shari'ah and said, for example, we are currently in a state of suspension regarding the cheese, as I explained. But we are certain that regarding the soap, this pig fat or the fat of the dead animal has transformed into another entity. This transformation is purifying in the ruling of the Shari'ah. I think this is in your knowledge, of course, that transformation is purifying. So in that case, this soap that comes to us, having changed the entity of the pig fat or the fat of the dead animal and taken on another reality, we use it as pure soap. But it is not permissible for us to compound this type, for the reasons explained earlier.

The questioner : I do not know. What I see in the specific matter of soap is that we distinguish between the fat of a dead animal whose origin was permissible if slaughtered properly, and the pig. As for the pig, whether slaughtered or not, it is all rejected: its bone, its meat, its fat, its skin, and its hair.

The Shaykh : Correct, but may Allah reward you for the conclusion.

The questioner : Even if it transformed, it was only begun with an entity that was originally forbidden.

The Shaykh : No, there is a consideration in that conjunction. Your saying "even if it transformed," so we have returned from our saying...

The questioner : I mean, if it transformed, it was only begun with something that the Shari'ah rejected completely. Whereas the animal that died, its fat was only forbidden because it was not slaughtered properly?

The Shaykh : No problem, but it is forbidden in any case.

The questioner : Its entity transformed, or its composition transformed, and it became in another state.

The Shaykh : There is no difference, may Allah reward you. Look with me now at his saying (peace and blessings be upon him): This is a text that this hide, which was purified, was impure. Good. If we want—if the expression is correct—if we want to philosophize or give another reason, to explain why this impure hide was purified by tanning? Because the entities in it that were its impurity transformed into something else, and therefore it lost its impurity. Therefore, the impure transformed into the pure.

The questioner : Was the hide itself impure in its entity, or did it have impurity in it?

The Shaykh : No, it is impure. I mean, if we take, for example, a tiger or a lion, its eating is forbidden. We found it dead, flayed it, and took its skin and tanned it. It is impure and forbidden. But the tanner, as said in another hadith, .

The questioner : I mean, the distinction between forbidden and impure. I mean, when I say the tiger is impure or the tiger is forbidden to eat, is there a difference between the two matters?

The Shaykh : Between it being forbidden to eat or what?

The questioner : Or impure, for example.

The Shaykh : So here they coincide.

The questioner : They coincide at death. Before death?

The Shaykh : Yes, and we discussed at death, not before death.

The questioner : Before death, is its skin impure or forbidden?

The Shaykh : Like its meat.

The questioner : Forbidden.

The Shaykh : Of course, forbidden and impure coincide here. Because, as I said earlier, his saying (peace and blessings be upon him)... , what does that mean? That this hide is impure. And what is the ruling of the meat attached to it?

The questioner : Impure.

The Shaykh : Also, it is impure, and therefore your precision here has no benefit, because this hide that the Lawgiver has ruled to be impure, its meat is also impure. And if it is impure, eating it is forbidden. The scholars have a rule: every impure thing is forbidden, but not every forbidden thing is impure. Therefore, I started from his saying (peace and blessings be upon him): . He rules that this hide is impure. So there is a difference, for example, between a live sheep that we slaughtered, which is lawful for us to eat and whose skin is also lawful, but this skin cannot be used while it is wet and fresh; it must be tanned. When this sheep dies, it is not lawful to eat it, nor is it lawful... it is purified by tanning. Okay, now we move on. We have two images: a lawful sheep that was slaughtered, and a dead sheep whose meat is forbidden to eat. Now we come to the animal that, even if you slaughtered it a hundred times, remains forbidden; it remains as it is. What is the ruling on the skin of this animal? Is it impure or pure? Here comes his saying (peace and blessings be upon him): . This skin is purified by tanning, and its meat is impure. So here the two attributes meet: impurity and prohibition. We come to the pig. The pig is obviously forbidden to eat, so it is impure in itself, as the jurists say. So we took its skin and tanned it. This is its tanning; this tanning is purifying. Therefore, we should not distinguish between the case where the ingredient in the soap is from this pig fat, or from that leopard fat, or lion, or similar, because this is forbidden and impure, and that is forbidden and impure. And thus it becomes clear, and Allah knows best, that we do not initially look at the soap-making process, that they took pig fat, and this is forbidden. We look at the end result. As is said in matters other than this: deeds are judged by their endings. We are now giving an example for the jurists, while reminding them that the jurists dealt with the previous hadith . Does it include, for example, forbidden animals, especially like the pig? Excuse me, especially like the dog. It was said and said; some included the dog in the generality of the hadith, and some excluded it. And the one who excluded the dog excludes the pig a fortiori. But the hadith was general and did not specify, as a concession to the Ummah. I return to say: when the jurists said that transformation is purifying in this desert by the known natural elements—winds, rains, sun, and the like—this *fatais* (a type of salt deposit) transformed into a salt mine, into salt. You look at it now and do not know anything except that it is salt. You taste it and do not feel anything except that it is salt. Someone else, for example, knows because he is a son of that land that this was a *fatais* one day, and it transformed by those elements into salt. There is no difference between... in the result, this salt is lawful for you just as it is lawful for him, even though he knows the origin and you do not know the origin. We move to the final image: this salt, its origin in the well is carrion. Two things: it is forbidden in its origin, then it became dead, so darkness upon darkness. This pig transformed into salt in taste, flavor, and reality, to the end, in chemical terms exactly. So you look at this result and say: this is salt, and it is pure, and it is lawful. That one cannot contradict you because he knows the origin of this animal is a pig, and a dead pig. . As long as the ending is lawfulness and purity, that is what we are obligated to do. We have this soap; we do not look at what they did. Suppose they brought an impurity and, by some chemical method, transformed it with fine art into this soap... and a purifier and disinfectant, and so on. We look at this result. We are not obligated to look at this result; we are not obligated to look at the beginning of the matter in the face of this result. But we are obligated not to produce this result, because that obligates us to commit the forbidden, using, as we said earlier, the impurity, the meat of the pig, which is forbidden. This is not permissible. For example, using the forbidden alcohol is not permissible. But they used the alcohol and compounded this medicine. We looked at this medicine and found no intoxicant, so it is lawful. It is not permissible to forbid it. This is what we testify to Allah. And we want to seek the help of specialists to know the numerous complaints regarding types of cheese and butter. And now it occurred to me: does your answer regarding butter coincide with your answer regarding soap, or with your answer regarding...?

The questioner : With certainty, because it only separates from the original.

The Shaykh : After, may Allah bless you, what about those who are affected by it? Also, fats? Is your answer if there are fats the same as your answer regarding cheeses?

The questioner: Yes.

The Shaykh : It is this, okay... who do you see.

The questioner : I mean, the supposed Dr. Al-Hawari, he is supposed to have, first, a laboratory and the ability to analyze.

The Shaykh : I mean, not every analytical doctor, not every doctor.

The questioner : Because it is a general analysis, its methods have become limited, meaning specializations, unlike in the past when they would say this is an analyst if he knows everything.

The Shaykh : ... My Lord, increase me in knowledge ... .