Muwatta, Book of Zakat

The Book of Zakat is the third book of the Muwatta in the transmission of Yahya ibn Yahya al-Laythi from Malik ibn Anas, in the edition of Bashshar Awwad Ma'ruf (1997). It occupies pages 333 to 384 of the first volume in the PDF pagination, and contains 129 numbered texts (652–780) in thirty chapters. Most of its texts are Malik's opinions on the details of zakat: its nisab, its year, and its categories, interspersed with a few connected hadiths and reports from Abu Bakr, Umar, Uthman, Ibn Umar and Umar ibn Abd al-Aziz ^{1 2}.

• What zakat is due on: coin, minerals, and buried treasure (652–672): the hadith of Abu Sa'id that there is no charity on less than five camels, less than five ounces, or less than five wasqs, transmitted by two routes; the letter of Umar ibn Abd al-Aziz that charity is due on crops, coin, and livestock; reports from Abu Bakr and Uthman on taking zakat from gifts and on the condition of a full year; Malik's opinions on the nisab of gold and silver, on the zakat of partners, and on profits; the Prophet ﷺ's grant to Bilal ibn al-Harith of the mines of al-Qabaliyya; and the hadith on buried treasure, which includes the fifth. ^{1 3}.
• What carries no zakat: jewellery, orphans' property, inheritance, debt, goods, and hoarding (673–696): Aisha and Ibn Umar did not pay zakat on jewellery; Umar's saying "trade with orphans' property so that zakat does not consume it"; Uthman's saying "this is the month of your zakat"; Umar ibn Abd al-Aziz's letter to Ruzayq ibn Hayyan on the tithes of merchants; Malik's opinions on the zakat of debt and of goods held for trade; and Ibn Umar's definition of hoarded wealth as wealth from which zakat is not paid. ^{4 5}.
• Zakat on livestock (697–717): the letter of Umar ibn al-Khattab on the obligations for camels and sheep, as Malik read it; the report of Mu'adh on cattle; Malik's opinions on combining sheep and goats, camels and cattle, on profits and the nisab, on the charity of partners, on what counts of young animals, and on charity for two years when they come together; and the prohibition of harassing people over charity, with Umar's saying: "Do not take the best estimates of the Muslims' property." ^{6 7}.
• Collecting charity, and who may receive it (718–723): the cut-off report of Ata ibn Yasar on the five who may receive charity even when they are rich; the ruler's judgement in dividing it; Abu Bakr's saying: "If they withheld from me a cord, I would fight them for it"; and Umar drinking the milk of charity camels. ^{8 9}.
• Zakat on fruit, grain, and olives (724–750): the cut-off reports of Sulayman ibn Yasar and Busr ibn Sa'id on the tithe and the half-tithe, estimating palm dates and grapes, blight, the kinds of grain and olives, and fruit, vegetables and herbs on which zakat is not due; and Malik's view on the verse of the Cattle about giving its due on the day of harvest, al-An'am 141 ^{9 10}.
• Slaves, horses, honey, the poll tax and the tithes (751–765): the hadith of Abu Hurayra (may God be pleased with him), "there is no charity on a Muslim for his slave or his horse"; Umar's answer to Abu Ubayda on charity for horses; the poll tax of the People of the Book and of the Magians, and the hadith of Abd al-Rahman ibn Awf (may God be pleased with him), "deal with them as you deal with the People of the Book"; Umar setting the poll tax at four dinars and forty dirhams; the one-eyed camel among the poll-tax animals; and Malik's long opinion that there is no charity on the protected people in their property, but that they owe a tenth when they trade in the lands of the Muslims; and the tithes of the Nabataeans. ^{10 11}.
• Buying back charity, and the zakat al-fitr (766–780): the Prophet's instruction to Umar not to buy back the horse he had given in the way of God; then the chapters on zakat al-fitr: on whom it is due, its measure as one sa' of dates or barley by the Prophet's sa', the time of sending it, and on whom it is not due. ^{11 2}.

This book is the clearest of the Muwatta's books in showing Malik's own view. The phrases "the matter agreed upon among us", "the Sunna on which there is no disagreement among us", and "this is the most beloved of what I have heard to me" recur. Malik sets out the questions with numerical examples in dinars, dirhams, wasqs and heads of livestock, and in places he argues from the hadith of Abu Sa'id on the nisab and from Umar's letter. Connected hadiths are few here, and there are cut-off reports, which the editor explains, saying which were connected and which he prefers as cut off ^{12 13}.

In this book the editor answers Ibn Abd al-Barr at several points. The most notable is his defence of Malik's chain in the hadith of Ibn Abi Sa'sa'a, where he shows that al-Bukhari transmitted it in two places. He reconsiders the hadith "charity is not lawful for a rich man except for five", preferring the cut-off version after having graded the connected version as sound in his note on Ibn Majah. He records errors of Yahya ibn Yahya in some chains, such as the added "and" between Sulayman ibn Yasar and Irak ibn Malik, and explains the words used for livestock, camels' ages and weights. These judgements are kept in the museum's records under the names of those who gave them ^{14 15 10}.

Each text of the book has its own record. It gives, in their particular wording, what the text says, names its highest narrator and its chapter, and records the editor's takhrij, with a short excerpt from the text where it suits. See Zakat, Charity and the poll tax ¹.