Giving zakat to funds that support needy students

A question about giving zakat to private funds that support needy students, in which Jordan's General Iftaa Department answered that students receive zakat as poor people, not as students, under certain conditions, and that a trustworthy fund may be appointed as agent to pass it on to them without taking a fee from the zakat. ¹

The questioner asked whether zakat may be given to private funds that support needy students. ¹

The Department answered that the recipients of zakat are limited to the eight categories named in the Qur'an, citing al-Baydawi's commentary that zakat is for these and no others, so it may not be given to anyone else. ¹ It said poor students receive zakat as poor people, not because they are students, on condition that study prevents them from earning and that they are diligent in it, citing al-Khatib al-Shirbini's Mughni al-Muhtaj that someone occupied with religious learning who cannot also earn a living may take zakat. ¹ It added the conditions that the knowledge be of the kind that meets the community's collective needs, which in its view now includes necessary worldly sciences such as medicine, engineering and physics alongside the religious sciences, and that the student not be someone the zakat payer is already obliged to support. ¹ It said the zakat payer may appoint a trustworthy person or body as agent to hand the zakat to poor students, either giving them the money to pay their fees or, with their permission, paying their instalments to the university directly. ¹ It concluded that zakat may be given to such funds if they are trustworthy and take no fee from it, passing it on voluntarily, and that they may be appointed as agents to give it to poor, diligent students. ¹

Jordan's General Iftaa Department published this fatwa on aliftaa.jo as no. 3901, dated 22 July 2024. ¹ The museum records this text as a historical document attributed to the body or scholar that issued it; it issues no ruling of its own.