Zakat and Fasting in Al-Muhadhdhab

Al-Shirazi's treatment of zakah and sawm in Al-Muhadhdhab follows the comprehensive pattern of the work: Shafi'i rulings presented with their evidence, compared with other schools, and explained with attention to both the textual basis and the practical application.

The zakah chapter opens with the obligation's basis in the Quran and its fundamental purposes: supporting the poor (fuqara') and needy (masakin), funding the collection and distribution apparatus, winning hearts for Islam, freeing those in bondage, relieving those burdened by debt in public interest contexts, supporting those striving in the path of God, and facilitating the travel of those who are stranded. These eight categories from Surah at-Tawbah (9:60) define who receives zakah and explain why it is both an act of worship and a pillar of social justice.

Al-Shirazi explains the Shafi'i position that zakah is obligatory on the wealth of minors: the guardian pays it from the minor's own property without waiting for the child to reach puberty. The basis is the hadith in which the Prophet said to Umar: 'Trade with orphans' wealth lest zakah consume it' — indicating that orphans' wealth is subject to zakah. He contrasts this with the Hanafi position (no zakah on minors' wealth) and explains the Shafi'i reasoning.

On trade merchandise, al-Shirazi specifies the conditions that make goods subject to zakah: the goods must have been acquired through exchange (not by inheritance or gift without trade intent), they must be valued at the nisab threshold, and a full lunar year must pass while they are held with trade intent. He addresses the case of a merchant who abandons trade intent partway through the year: in the Shafi'i view, the hawl resets, and zakah is not due until a full year passes from the point when trade intent is resumed.

For livestock, al-Shirazi works through the detailed tables established by the prophetic letters on zakah, which are among the most carefully preserved documentary records in Islamic hadith literature. He explains the sa'imah condition: livestock must be freely grazing (not stall-fed at the owner's expense) for the full year to be subject to zakah. Stall-fed livestock are exempt. He addresses the mixed herd question (a man who owns some cattle and some sheep, neither category reaching its own nisab) and explains that different species are not combined for nisab purposes.

The chapter on sawm presents the Ramadan obligation and its rulings with particular attention to the question of sighting the Ramadan moon. The Shafi'i school holds that the beginning of Ramadan is established by a single trustworthy witness's testimony if the sky was obscured, or by widespread public sighting (tawatur) if the sky was clear. Al-Shirazi examines the hadiths on moon-sighting with care and explains why the Shafi'i school requires the sighting to be visible from the local horizon — moon-sighting in one country does not automatically obligate fasting in another country with a different horizon.

Al-Shirazi's discussion of who may break the fast (and what the consequences are) follows the standard Shafi'i categories: illness, travel, pregnancy and nursing (when there is concern for health), and the inability of the elderly. He explains the distinction between breaking the fast temporarily (with qada) and the permanent inability to fast (with fidyah), and the specific Shafi'i rule that the pregnant or nursing woman who breaks her fast out of concern for the child — not for herself — owes both qada and fidyah.