#590: Is Zakāt Obligatory on the Wealth of the Minor?
QUESTION
” Zakat is not due on children who are minor and prepubescent in the Hanafi school. However, according to the Shafi’i, Maliki and Hanbali schools, Zakat is obligatory on the wealth of minor children also. #FiqhofZakat
Assalaamu alaykum ma, please help me with more light on this👆🏻
ANSWER
Wa alaykum Salām Warahmatullāh Wabarakātuh.
Alhamdulillāh.
This statement is true and correct.
That Zakāt must be taken from the Zakatable Wealth of Minors who haven’t reached the age of puberty is the position held by ‘Umar Ibn Al-Khattāb, ‘Alī Ibn Abī Tālib, Ibn ‘Umar, ‘Ā’ishah, Al-Hasan Ibn ‘Alī and Jābir Ibn ‘Abdillah – radiyallāhu ‘anhum – among the Sahābah; Imām Ibn Sīrīn, ‘Atā and Mujāhid among the Tābi’īn; Imām Mālik, Ash-Shāfi’ī, Ahmad Ibn Hanbal, and the Imams within their Schools.
And this is the position strengthened by proof from Kitāb and Sunnah due to the generality of the Texts that command that Zakāt be taken out of wealth without a restriction to the wealth of the Adult.
The inference derived by the ‘Ulamā is that Zakāt is an obligation on the Wealth of every Muslim once his wealth meets the criteria of Zakāt (I.e. Zakatable).
The Criteria are two:
1. That it reaches the Nisāb
2. That it has remained for a year
The Hanafi position stating that the wealth of the minor and the insane is exempted from Zakāt is weak and isolated.
Imām An-Nawawī – rahimahullāh – explained all of this in his encyclopedia of Fiqh Al-Majmū’ Shar’hu Al-Muhadhdhab
Allāh knows best.
Bārakallāhu fīkum
Jazākumullāhu Khayran
9th Ramadān, 1439 AH.
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