His statement, “Whoever omits an obligatory duty must offer a sacrificial animal”: we have mentioned that the obligatory duties are seven. When jurists use the unqualified term “blood,” they mean one-seventh of a camel, one-seventh of a cow, or one sheep or goat. It must meet the conditions of an udhiyah sacrifice: it must have reached the legally stipulated age—five years for camels, two years for cattle, one year for goats, and half a year, namely six months, for sheep. It must also be free of defects that prevent validity, such as obvious one-eyedness and the like.
This sacrifice is a compensatory offering, not an offering of gratitude. Therefore, it must be slaughtered within the Sacred Precinct, given entirely in charity to its poor, and distributed there. If it is slaughtered outside the Sacred Precinct, it does not suffice. Even if the sacrificial animal for tamattuʿ or qirān is slaughtered at Arafah, it does not suffice, because it has been slaughtered outside the place legally stipulated. If one slaughters it at Arafah, it is as though he had slaughtered it in China. And if, for example, he slaughtered it in China and brought it to Arafah, it would not suffice. The area outside the Sacred Precinct is all the same, from Arafah to the furthest part of the world.
Some Shafiʿi scholars said that there is no problem if he slaughters it outside the Sacred Precinct and distributes it within the Sacred Precinct, because its recipients are the people of the Sacred Precinct, and he has delivered it to them. However, it may be said that this is incorrect, because it makes no distinction between slaughtering it within the Sacred Precinct and slaughtering it outside it. Slaughter is an act of worship, and worship within the Sacred Precinct is superior to worship outside it. If he slaughters it outside the Sacred Precinct, he has missed that superiority, and it is therefore not valid. Although the aim of giving charity to the poor of the Sacred Precinct is for it to reach them, the slaughter itself is also an act of worship. Thus, transferring it from a virtuous place to an inferior one entails that it does not suffice—just as if someone vowed to pray two rakʿahs in the Sacred Mosque, it would not be valid for him to pray the two rakʿahs in the mosque