What is the ruling on using perfumes that are likely to contain alcohol?
Machine translationRead the Arabic original
The questioner : What is the ruling on perfumes in use that are likely to contain alcohol?
The Shaykh : If the alcohol content is high enough that it is likely that drinking it would intoxicate alcoholics in the same way that wine intoxicates them, then in this case it is wine, and it is not permissible to sell it, buy it, or use it in any way. However, if the alcohol content is low, it is permissible to use it, but it is not permissible to manufacture it. It is permissible to use it, but not to manufacture it, meaning to compound it. One is only permitted to buy it ready-made from the lands of disbelief and misguidance. As for one who compounds perfumes by mixing the alcohol, which is the mother of wine, with other liquids, including a type of fragrance, it is self-evident that compounding these perfumes entails either buying the alcohol or distilling it, and all of that is forbidden. However, if it comes ready-made, like some medicines in which we are certain there is some alcohol, in this case we look at this medicine or this cologne, for example. If the alcohol content in them does not make the drink or the substance an intoxicating wine, then it is permissible to buy it and use it for fragrance, but it is not permissible to manufacture it. Even the medicine is not permissible to manufacture locally, given that one is compelled to put some alcohol in it, as I mentioned earlier.
Where does this alcohol come from? Either he distills and manufactures it himself from orange peels and the like, or he buys it ready-made. Whether it is this or that, based on the saying of the Messenger:Sunan Abi Dawud 3674Sahih (Al-Albani) and so on, all of this falls under the generality of the saying of Allah the Exalted: [Al-Ma'idah 5:2] Thus, the fragrance used today under the name of cologne is forbidden or not forbidden according to the alcohol content. I have been informed that many colognes, and the expression is accurate, have a very high alcohol content, seventy or eighty percent, such that some alcoholics in some Islamic countries where they cannot easily access manufactured wine substitute this wine with this cologne that has this high alcohol content. They mix in things to perhaps reduce some of the bitterness or the like, and then they drink it.
Yes.
The Shaykh : If the alcohol content is high enough that it is likely that drinking it would intoxicate alcoholics in the same way that wine intoxicates them, then in this case it is wine, and it is not permissible to sell it, buy it, or use it in any way. However, if the alcohol content is low, it is permissible to use it, but it is not permissible to manufacture it. It is permissible to use it, but not to manufacture it, meaning to compound it. One is only permitted to buy it ready-made from the lands of disbelief and misguidance. As for one who compounds perfumes by mixing the alcohol, which is the mother of wine, with other liquids, including a type of fragrance, it is self-evident that compounding these perfumes entails either buying the alcohol or distilling it, and all of that is forbidden. However, if it comes ready-made, like some medicines in which we are certain there is some alcohol, in this case we look at this medicine or this cologne, for example. If the alcohol content in them does not make the drink or the substance an intoxicating wine, then it is permissible to buy it and use it for fragrance, but it is not permissible to manufacture it. Even the medicine is not permissible to manufacture locally, given that one is compelled to put some alcohol in it, as I mentioned earlier.
Where does this alcohol come from? Either he distills and manufactures it himself from orange peels and the like, or he buys it ready-made. Whether it is this or that, based on the saying of the Messenger:
Allah has cursed wine, its drinker, its server, its seller, its buyer, its presser, the one for whom it is pressed, the one who conveys it, and the one to whom it is conveyed.
لَعَنَ اللَّهُ الْخَمْرَ وَشَارِبَهَا وَسَاقِيَهَا وَبَائِعَهَا وَمُبْتَاعَهَا وَعَاصِرَهَا وَمُعْتَصِرَهَا وَحَامِلَهَا وَالْمَحْمُولَةَ إِلَيْهِbut do not cooperate in sin and aggression
وَلَا تَعَاوَنُوا عَلَى الْإِثْمِ وَالْعُدْوَانِYes.
Source
www.al-albany.com
The Arabic text is copied verbatim from the original source, without any edits.