6 - The Debtor (The Indebted Person).

The Shaykh : The debtor is the one who has a debt in his liability to people, whether it is the price of a house, the rent of a house, or anything else.
This debtor is given [charity], but on the condition that he is truly a debtor. He is not considered a debtor unless he is unable to pay off the debt. Are you with me? If he is wealthy, is he called a debtor? No, why? The wealthy person takes from the [charity] and gives his creditor what he owes; he is not a debtor. A debtor must be unable to pay off the debt. But unable to pay off the debt. How much is your debt? He said his debt is fifty thousand. Do we give him fifty thousand? But that is a lot, fifty thousand. The debt is fifty thousand, do we give him fifty thousand? I do not want this soft, easy answer. Do we give it to him or not? We give it to him to clear his debt, even if it is fifty thousand, because the description of being a debtor cannot be removed from him unless he pays off, unless he settles all of his debt. We give him the entire debt, but do we give him the money and say, "Take it and pay your creditor," or do we go to his creditor and pay him?
No. There is a distinction: If the debtor who owes the debt is a trustworthy man who wants to settle his liability and does not like to have even a single qirsh remaining on him unless he pays it off, then we give it to him and say, "Take it, you pay it." Why? Because it is more comfortable for him, stronger for his heart, and further from him being indebted to us. But if you go and expose him among the people, saying, "So-and-so, you are asking So-and-so for money," that is harmful to him. But if the debtor is a spendthrift, if we give him the money, he will say, "This is to pay your debt," and he will go and waste it. He had a car... and we gave him fifty thousand to pay it off, he bought a press for fifty thousand, and the debt is later. Do we give it to him or not? Why? Because if we give it to him, he will not pay the debt; he will play with it. So we do not give it to him. We give it to his creditor and say, "So-and-so, this is for your thousand. You are asking So-and-so for fifty thousand. This is fifty thousand, and the liability is cleared." Or not? It is cleared, because Allah the Exalted said: . "In the necks and the debtors." The "in" (fi) is for the circumstance, and "the poor" (al-fuqara) has the "for" (li) for ownership. So it is clear from this that the debtor is not required to take ownership of it, and that if we pay off his debt and remove this description from him, that is sufficient. Good.