Zakat, Fasting, and Hajj in Al-Furu'

Ibn Muflih's treatment of the financial and ritual pillars in Al-Furu' brings his characteristic encyclopedic breadth to bear on zakah, sawm, and hajj, documenting the range of Hanbali positions and incorporating Ibn Taymiyyah's occasional departures from the school's mainstream positions.

The zakah chapter covers all categories of zakatable wealth in detail. On zakah on honey — one of the Hanbali school's distinctive positions — Ibn Muflih presents the evidential basis and the internal discussion. He notes Ibn Taymiyyah's position that zakah on honey is established by the sunnah and should be applied, while acknowledging that the Maliki and Shafi'i schools do not recognize it. The Hanafi school recognizes zakah on honey but with different details from the Hanbali position.

On zakah on agricultural produce, the Hanbali school follows the hadith evidence closely: a 10% rate for rain-irrigated crops and 5% for irrigation-dependent crops. Ibn Muflih discusses the question of which crops are subject to zakah — the Hanbali school applies it to crops that are measured by the sa' and can be stored, primarily grains and dates, with disagreement on fresh fruits and vegetables. He presents the different positions on fruits and vegetables without definitively resolving the dispute, reflecting the genuine internal diversity on this question.

The sawm chapter presents the Hanbali positions on the intention, the nullifiers, and the concessions of fasting with careful attention to Ibn Taymiyyah's views. On the question of injection (medical or otherwise) breaking the fast, Ibn Taymiyyah's position — that injections into veins do not break the fast because they do not follow the normal route of nourishment — is presented as a significant scholarly view. This question, already present in Ibn Muflih's time in the context of cupping (hijamah, which blood-letting does break the fast in the Hanbali view), became increasingly important as medical technology advanced.

On hajj, Al-Furu' is thorough on the rites and their variations. Ibn Muflih discusses the Hanbali positions on the stoning of the jamarat — the specific stones to use, the sequence, the acceptable window of time for each stoning — and the rulings on what happens if one stone is missed or lands outside the pit. He presents Ibn Taymiyyah's view that the purpose of the stoning is the remembrance of Allah and the following of the Sunnah, not any pre-Islamic symbolic act, and that this understanding should inform how the rite is performed.

The sections on hajj for women cover the mahram requirement — that a woman performing hajj must be accompanied by her husband or a male relative who is permanently unmarriageable to her — and the rulings when no mahram is available. Ibn Muflih documents Ibn Taymiyyah's view that the obligation of hajj falls away from a woman who has no mahram, as the obligation is conditional on ability, and ability for a woman includes the security of travel.