http://www.jumuamosquect.com/khutbas-old/imam-habib-bewley/12th-february-2010.

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Khutba on Importance of Zakat

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Islam is built on five: testifying that there is no god but Allah and that Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah, establishing the prayer, paying the zakat, fasting Ramadan, and making the Hajj pilgrimage to the Sacred House of Allah. This fact, that the deen of Allah is built on five pillars, is something that every single one of us knows, for it is the very first thing we learn when we become Muslim. Indeed, it is something that even the vast majority of nonMuslims know. But in recent years, one of those pillars has fallen by the wayside and has moved from being right at the centre of the general Muslim consciousness to being on its periphery. In the minds of many Muslims, this pillar has ceased to be a fundamental, essential aspect of the deen but has become more of an afterthought. Which pillar is it that we are talking about? It is not the shahadatayn, for no Muslim fails to utter them. It is not the prayer, for never has the adhan been heard in so many parts of the world nor the jumu'a prayers been so packed and well-attended. It is not the fast of Ramadan, for even Muslims who neglect their prayers undertake the fast. And it is not the Hajj, for more Muslims visit the House of Allah each year than have ever done so in the history of Islam. No, the pillar that has been lost is zakat, for although most Muslims nominally affirm it, almost nowhere is it afforded the prime importance it is due. For the truth is that the vast majority of the world's Muslims view it as an obligatory act of charity, a private act of worship where the payment is left to the conscience of the individual. But that is to fundamentally misunderstand both what zakat is and how important it is. The reality of zakat - the form that zakat actually takes - I will leave to the second khutba. As for its importance, the strongest indication of that is that, almost every time Allah mentions it in the Quran, and that is at least thirty times, He pairs it with the prayer, the imad (central support) of the deen. For example, Allah says,

the translation of which is, They were only ordered to worship Allah, making their deen sincerely His as p eople of pure natural belief, and to establish the prayer and pay zakat that is the correct deen. And He says,

the translation of which is, Establish the prayer and pay the zakat and obey the Messenger so that hopefully mercy will be shown to you.

This is interpreted by the Mufassirun and other people of knowledge as meaning that the establishment of the prayer and the payment of zakat are inextricably linked, with the validity of one being contingent upon the other. And that is confirmed by the famous statement of Ibn Abbas,

There are three things that are not accepted until three other things are in place: Allah says, Obey Allah and obey the Messenger, so if anyone obeys Allah without obeying the Messenger, Allah will not accept his obedience; Allah says, Thank Me and thank your parents, so if anyone thanks Allah without thanking his parents, Allah will not accept his thanks; and Allah says, Establish the prayer and pay the zakat, so if anyone establishes the prayer without paying the zakat (that he owes), Allah will not accept his prayer. It is clear from this that paying zakat preserves the well-being of a persons deen, but it also preserves the well being of his dunya, for far from decreasing your wealth, zakat actually increases it, both in real terms and in terms of the degree to which it benefits you. For the knowledge that you will pay zakat on your wealth actually causes you to invest it and make use of it, rather than simply storing it away and leaving it to stagnate and depreciate. It ensures that the lifeblood of a society circulates in a healthy manner, and does not clot up and gather in a single place causing it to grind to a halt and die, which is exactly what riba does. Allah says,

the translation of which is, Allah obliterates riba but makes sadaqa grow in value! And He says,

the translation of which is, What you give with usurious intent, aiming to get back a greater amount from people's wealth, does not become greater with Allah. But anything you give as zakat, seeking the Face of Allah all who do that will get back twice as much. And the Prophet said,

A persons wealth has never been decreased by sadaqa (i.e. zakat). You must never view zakat as a tax and therefore give it grudgingly, fearing that you lose something by giving it. On the contrary, those who give it gladly are the biggest winners, for not only are they purified of their own wrong actions in the process, but so too is their wealth. Zakat is the medicine that cleanses a persons wealth and protects it from harm. The Prophet said,

When someone pays zakat on his wealth, whatever bad there is in it is removed. And he also said,

Protect your wealth by means of zakat, and treat your sick by means of sadaqa. We must all remember that what wealth we have is not truly ours, but rather is a trust that Allah has placed in our hands. Allah says,

the translation of which is, Have iman in Allah and His Messenger and give of that to which He has made you khalifas. Al-Qurtubi says in his tafsir about the words mustakhlafina fihi - that to which He has made you khalifas,

They mean that the wealth that is in your hands is Allahs wealth since it was He who created it. However, It is simply that He has given you the enjoyment of it and made you representatives of His when it comes to making use of it. Our wealth is an amana, parts of which Allah has assigned to us and our families and dependents and parts of which He has assigned to the fuqara and the other categories to which zakat is due. When we give zakat, we are not giving charity at all, we are simply returning to others what is rightly due to them. We are simply obeying the Command of Allah, for Allah has said,

the translation of which is, Allah commands you to return to their owners the things you hold on trust. Zakat lifts up the poor and purifies the rich and there is no shame in giving it, taking it or receiving it. And its proper implementation is the means to restoring and revitalising the Muslim umma. So we ask Allah to reestablish it amongst us in all its glory.

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What I have mentioned in the first khutba was purely to allow you to understand how important and beneficial zakat is to the individual who pays it. But although zakat is an individual act of worship in the sense that it is a duty on every Muslim who has the necessary level of wealth to pay it with the intention of fulfilling that aspect of the deen, it is also a function of amirate, it is also inextricably linked to governance, and in that regard is different from the remainder of the pillars of Islam. For zakat to truly be fulfilled in the way that Allah intends it to be fulfilled, there must be an amir who collects it and distributes it. It must be taken. In surat at-Tawba, Allah says,

the translation of which is, Take sadaqa from their wealth to purify and cleanse them. According to the mufassirun, the word sadaqa in this aya refers specifically to zakat. So, in other words, Allah is commanding His Prophet to take the zakat from people's wealth, not leave it up to them to decide whether or not to give it to him. The reality of zakat is that it is taken and not given. This has always been the understanding of the Muslim umma and has always been the practice of its leaders, from the very inception of the Muslim state. Indeed, the very first thing that Abu Bakr did upon coming to power and being informed that the tribes who had paid zakat to the Prophet were now refusing to pay it to him, was to say,

By Allah, I will fight anyone who makes a distinction between the prayer and zakat. Zakat is the right which is due on wealth. By Allah, if they refuse me a hobbling rope which they used to pay to the Messenger of Allah, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, I will fight them for it! He saw the institution of zakat as being such a fundamental cog in the welfare of the Muslim state that he was prepared to risk the survival of the nascent Muslim umma to restore it. This report indicates that, contrary to popular belief, the collection and distribution of zakat is the right of the amir, not the individual who pays it. The amir and his representatives take it from the rich and distribute it among the poor, as is indicated from the instructions the Prophet gave Muadh ibn Jabal when he sent him to Yemen,

Inform them that Allah has made it obligatory for zakat to be taken from their wealthy and given back to their poor. This was the ijma of the four imams and of all the major fuqaha from their madhahib, and it applies just as much to hidden wealth, such as gold, silver and trade goods, as to apparent wealth, such as livestock and crops, as is proven by the statement of Umar ibn al-Khattab, ...

Take from the Muslims out of every forty dirhams one dirham. And the sta tement of the Umayyad khalifa, Umar ibn AbdalAziz, ..

Take from the Muslims out of every forty dinars one dinar, for these statements are specific instructions to zakat collectors to take gold and silver. Indeed the Hanafi faqih, Shaykh Abu Bakr Muhammad ibn Abi Sahl asSarkhasi, went so far as to say that anyone who paid his zakat to other than the ruler, had not met his obligation of zakat and still owed it. And Imam Ahmad is quoted in the book ash-Sharh ar-Rabbani li Musnad Ahmad as having said, The khalifa alone has the authority and responsibility to collect and distribute zakat, whether by himself or through those he appoints, and he has the authority and responsibility to fight those who refuse to pay it. So, zakat is a political matter, not a private one. And without leadership, without governance, an essential aspect of it is lost. It is no longer zakat, but merely a poor facsimile of it. The link between zakat and governance today has been well and truly cut and that is why we see the Muslim umma in the sorry state that it is in. There is not now and has not been for nearly a century anyone to take from the wealthy and give to the poor. That function of the amir is not being fulfilled because there has been no amir. And so zakat has been relegated to the status of an obligatory charity that is either given to the poor members of ones own family or to charitable institutions that send the money abroad or something that is simply not given at all. But such institutions have no right to your zakat because they neither fall into one of the eight categories nor has any authority appointed them as collectors. And so all they succeed in doing is misappropriating the funds of well-intentioned Muslims and preventing them from fulfilling their obligation correctly. No, there can be no zakat in its full and original sense until we have leaders and those leaders take on the responsibility of collecting and distributing it. There can be no zakat until we have imara. And so the first step towards its restoration is, like I said two weeks ago, giving baya to an amir, even if that is only in its first stages at a local level. Then and only then will the pillar be restored. So we ask Allah to restore leadership amongst us so that we can once again make the deen whole and recover the missing foundation of the house.

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