Zakat, Fasting, and Hajj

The chapters on zakah, sawm (fasting), and hajj in Sunan ad-Darimi form the core of its treatment of the remaining three pillars of Islam beyond salah. These sections demonstrate ad-Darimi's approach to applying hadith evidence to the practical requirements of Muslim life.

The zakah section opens with narrations establishing zakah as one of the five pillars and the gravity of withholding it. Ad-Darimi then moves through the specific categories of wealth subject to zakah: gold and silver with their respective nisab (minimum threshold) calculations, trade goods, livestock by type and minimum herd size, and agricultural produce with its distinctions between rain-watered and manually irrigated crops. A recurring feature is ad-Darimi's inclusion of hadiths that had practical legal implications in the jurisprudential debates of his time — for example, narrations about zakah on horses, which was a contested question among early scholars.

The fasting section covers the month of Ramadan comprehensively. Hadiths address the sighting of the moon to begin and end the fast, the proper intention, what breaks the fast and what does not, the rulings on travelers and the sick, the expiation (kaffarah) required for deliberate breaking of the fast, and the special virtue of the last ten nights including Laylat al-Qadr. The Sunan preserves narrations on voluntary fasts as well: the six days of Shawwal, the fast of Arafah, Ashura, and the broader principle of fasting Mondays and Thursdays as the Prophet was reported to have done.

The hajj section is among the more detailed in the Sunan, reflecting the centrality of this pillar and the complexity of its rites. Ad-Darimi includes hadiths on the obligation of hajj for those who are able, the rites of ihram including its restrictions, the tawaf around the Ka'bah, the sa'y between Safa and Marwa, the standing at Arafah, and the stoning of the jamarat. He also addresses the umrah and its relationship to hajj, the types of hajj (ifrad, qiran, tamattu'), and the sacrificial obligations connected to hajj.

Through these three pillars, ad-Darimi's Sunan provides a practical fiqh handbook grounded in authenticated chains. The collection's value here is not merely the rulings it records but the transmission pathways it documents — allowing later scholars to trace which legal positions in each madhab rested on narrations from which Companions and through which chains of transmission.