Q301 :People in my home country, India, say that a
wife may not perform pilgrimage, pay zakah or offer the sacrifice on
Eid Al-Adha using her husband’s money. She must have her own resources
to perform these duties. They say that if she utilizes her husband’s
money to do the pilgrimage, it is not valid. Please netment.
A301 : Islam treats both man and woman as equals
with regard to religious duties. Everyone is responsible for the
netpletion of his or her duties. Hence, a man is not responsible to pay
for the travel expenses of his wife in order that she fulfills the duty
of pilgrimage. However, if he willingly pays for her travel, she may
accept and go on pilgrimage. Her pilgrimage is certainly valid and her
reward is the same as every other pilgrims. The fact that she did not
pay for it does not detract from the validity of her pilgrimage. She
would have earned more reward if she were to pay for her own expenses.
In that case, she receives a reward for spending money in order to obey
Allah and a reward for fulfilling her duty. When her husband pays for
her pilgrimage, he also earns a generous reward from Allah. What
follows from this is that if a woman has a rich husband who is
unwilling to pay for her pilgrimage and she does not have money for her
own to cover her expenses, she does not meet the requirement of ability
which makes pilgrimage a binding duty. As you realize, pilgrimage is
required to be fulfilled by every Muslim, man or woman, who is able to
undertake the journey. That ability includes both the physical and the
financial. The sacrifice on the day of Eid is renetmended, not
obligatory. However, it is an act of worship for which reward is
granted by Allah. If a woman wants to do it, she should use her own
money. If she has no money and her husband offers to buy her the sheep
for sacrifice, she may accept that. Both of them will be rewarded by
Allah for their actions. Again, zakah is an individual duty. But zakah
is paid only by a person who has money in excess of the threshold of
zakah. Therefore, no husband needs to pay zakah on behalf of his wife,
if she has no money of her own. In this case, she has no zakah to pay.
The only exception is the zaka-tul-fitr at the end of Ramadhan. This is
a duty which the head of a family must fulfill on his own behalf and on
behalf of all his dependents including his wife and children and other
relatives, if he supports them. There is a point of confusion in the
question. While we say that the duty is binding on the individual, and
that the woman should pay for her own pilgrimage, it does not mean that
if someone else pays for it, the pilgrimage is not valid. It is indeed
valid and rewarded by Allah.
Our Dialogue ( Source : Arab News – Jeddah )