The weakest of these views is that zakat is due for past years even when one is unable to collect the debt. This view is invalid: it is inconceivable under the Sharia that they should be entitled to collect anything when the owner has received nothing. Moreover, if enough time passes, the zakat would exceed the wealth itself.

Furthermore, if the qualifying wealth diminishes and zakat is held to be due from that wealth itself, the amount payable could only be determined through a lengthy calculation of a kind that the Sharia could not prescribe.

The most plausible views are that nothing is due in any circumstances until the wealth has been held for a year, or that a single year’s zakat is due upon receipt. Each of these views has merit. The former is Abū Hanīfa’s view, and the latter is Mālik’s; both have also been held within Ahmad’s school. And Allah knows best.

He was asked:

A man owns camels and buys pasture for them during the grazing season. Is zakat due on them?

He answered:

If they graze for most of the year—for example, if he buys pasture for them for three or four months—he must pay zakat on them. This is the stronger of the scholars’ two views.