Zakat and Fasting: The Prophetic Teachings

Al-Wajiz fi Fiqh as-Sunnah presents zakah and sawm with the same commitment to direct evidential grounding that characterizes the rest of the work, ensuring the reader understands not just the rulings but their Quranic and prophetic sources.

zakah is established by the Quran as one of the five pillars of Islam and is repeatedly paired with prayer in the Quran's commands, signaling its centrality in the Islamic system of worship and social welfare. The Prophet said: 'Islam is built on five: testifying that there is no deity but Allah and that Muhammad is His messenger, establishing prayer, giving zakah, performing hajj, and fasting Ramadan' (al-Bukhari, Muslim). The Prophet sent Mu'adh ibn Jabal to Yemen with explicit instructions about what zakah is obligatory and on whom — a hadith that serves as the primary source for the zakah thresholds (nisab) on gold, silver, livestock, and agricultural produce.

For gold, the nisab is twenty mithqals (approximately 85 grams) and the rate is two and a half percent. For silver, it is two hundred dirhams (approximately 595 grams) at the same rate. For trade goods, their market value is assessed against the silver nisab and the same rate applies. These thresholds are established by the hadiths of the Prophet recorded in Abu Dawud, Tirmidhi, and others. Al-Wajiz notes that scholars differ on whether the gold or silver nisab should be used in the modern era when paper currencies are involved, a question the classical sources could not have anticipated.

For livestock, the zakah on camels begins at five camels (one sheep due); cattle at thirty (one yearling); sheep and goats at forty (one sheep). The detailed tables for livestock zakah are recorded in the preserved zakah instruction letters that the Prophet sent to governors. On agricultural produce, zakah is due at ten percent for rain-watered crops and five percent for irrigated crops — a distinction established by the Prophet's statement in al-Bukhari: 'On what the sky waters, one tenth; on what is irrigated, one twentieth.'

Fasting Ramadan was made obligatory in the second year after the Hijra. The Quran says: 'O you who believe, fasting has been prescribed for you as it was prescribed for those before you, so that you may attain taqwa' (al-Baqarah 2:183). The details of the fast — that it runs from the true dawn (Fajr as-sadiq) until sunset, that the intention is made each night, that food, drink, and sexual intercourse are the primary invalidating acts — are derived from combining the Quranic framework with the prophetic hadiths.

The Prophet's practice during Ramadan is described in numerous hadiths: he would delay the suhur (pre-dawn meal) until shortly before Fajr and hasten the iftar (breaking of fast) at sunset, saying 'People will remain in good as long as they hasten the iftar' (al-Bukhari). He recommended breaking the fast with dates or water. He performed the Tarawih prayer in congregation for several nights and then discontinued it lest it become obligatory — though his companions continued it after his death with Umar ibn al-Khattab's reorganization.

The expiation (kaffarah) for deliberately breaking the Ramadan fast without valid excuse is established by the hadith of the man who came to the Prophet saying he had been destroyed, having had intercourse with his wife during the day in Ramadan. The Prophet prescribed the kaffarah in order: free a slave, fast sixty consecutive days, or feed sixty poor people. This hadith, recorded in Bukhari and Muslim, is the foundation for one of the most serious expiation obligations in Islamic law.