Ruling on building schools with zakah
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Question:
What is your opinion, may Allah preserve you, regarding funding schools with zakah for their construction? And if zakah is distributed to students of knowledge, then in my view it is all the more appropriate that it be spent on schools?
Answer:
Schools are not to be built with zakah, nor are mosques, nor are hospitals; they are not to be built with zakah. Zakah has specific categories of recipients that Allah, Mighty and Majestic, specified in His saying, Exalted is He: [Surah al-Tawbah: 60]. These are the people entitled to zakah.
The intended meaning of[Al-Baqarah 2:154] is, that is, jihad. This is what the majority of scholars said: the intended meaning is jihad. Therefore, zakah funds are not to be spent on building mosques, nor on building schools and hospitals, nor on other charitable projects such as repairing roads or repairing ships to transport the poor, or the like.
However, if it is given to the needy students in the school, if there are poor students there, and you give them from the zakah, or to poor teachers who have no salaries, and you support their situation and give them from the zakah to help them in teaching the children of Muslims, all of this is good and there is no harm in it. There are two benefits: the benefit that they are poor, and the benefit that they are seeking knowledge or teaching people. Yes.
The presenter: May Allah reward you with good.
What is your opinion, may Allah preserve you, regarding funding schools with zakah for their construction? And if zakah is distributed to students of knowledge, then in my view it is all the more appropriate that it be spent on schools?
Answer:
Schools are not to be built with zakah, nor are mosques, nor are hospitals; they are not to be built with zakah. Zakah has specific categories of recipients that Allah, Mighty and Majestic, specified in His saying, Exalted is He:
Zakah expenditures are only for the poor and for the needy and for those employed to collect [zakah] and for bringing hearts together [for Islam] and for freeing captives [or slaves] and for those in debt and for the cause of Allah and for the [stranded] traveler - an obligation [imposed] by Allah
إِنَّمَا الصَّدَقَاتُ لِلْفُقَرَاءِ وَالْمَسَاكِينِ وَالْعَامِلِينَ عَلَيْهَا وَالْمُؤَلَّفَةِ قُلُوبُهُمْ وَفِي الرِّقَابِ وَالْغَارِمِينَ وَفِي سَبِيلِ اللَّهِ وَاِبْنِ السَّبِيلِ فَرِيضَةً مِنَ اللَّهِThe intended meaning of
in the way of Allah
في سبيل اللهHowever, if it is given to the needy students in the school, if there are poor students there, and you give them from the zakah, or to poor teachers who have no salaries, and you support their situation and give them from the zakah to help them in teaching the children of Muslims, all of this is good and there is no harm in it. There are two benefits: the benefit that they are poor, and the benefit that they are seeking knowledge or teaching people. Yes.
The presenter: May Allah reward you with good.
Source
binbaz.org.sa
The Arabic text is copied verbatim from the original source, without any edits.