and al-Majd said that this is a point of consensus. Shaykh al-Islam added: “The four Imams and the rest of the jurists—save for a lone dissent—are unanimously agreed that zakah is obligatory on trade merchandise.”
3. The hadith is proof that zakah is due on everything set aside for buying and selling, whatever the branch of commerce: foodstuffs, clothing, jewelry, utensils, real estate, livestock, company shares, and anything else intended for sale and profit.
4. Its implicit meaning is that items not earmarked for trade but kept for personal use—such as a residence, a means of transport, clothing, furnishings, or jewelry—are exempt from zakah, for they have been removed from the realm of growth.
5. The author cited this hadith after the two reports of ʿAmr ibn Shuʿayb and Umm Salamah only to qualify their unrestricted wording about the obligation of zakah on jewelry.
6. The zakah rate on merchandise is one quarter of one tenth, the same as for gold and silver.
7. Zakah is not due on wealth until a full lunar year has passed over it, except for profit earned from trade goods: its reckoning follows that of the original capital, so it is liable even if it has not itself completed a year.
8. At the year’s end, the merchandise is appraised in whichever of gold or silver best serves the poor. If its value reaches the nisab by one currency but not the other, the currency by which it attains the nisab is the standard applied.
9. Al-Bukhari (1395) and Muslim (982) narrate from Abu Hurayrah that the Prophet ﷺ said, “No sadaqah is due from a Muslim on his slave or his horse.” Al-Nawawi and others stated: this hadith is the foundation for the ruling that property kept for personal use is not subject to zakah, and it is the view of the scholars.
10. Al-Rawd and other works state: No zakah is due on the value of property set aside for rental, whether real estate, livestock, or otherwise, because it is not trade wealth. Rather, zakah is due on its rental income if that income reaches a nisab. This is the position of the four Imams.