that the property is unavailable and they borrow on its account to pay what is demanded, or use their own funds to pay on behalf of the property of their principal or the person under their guardianship, they are entitled to recover the corresponding amount from that property. This has been the practice of Muslims in every age and land. Whoever rejects this view adopts a position whose harmful consequences are known only to the Lord of all servants, for the levies unjustly imposed on property are exceedingly numerous.

If the sums that someone entrusted with another’s property pays on its behalf towards these levies, forcibly and wrongfully exacted from him, were charged against him when paid from his own funds, much of the wealth of trustworthy custodians would be lost. They would consequently have to refrain from undertaking such responsibilities, lest they lose their wealth. These responsibilities would then fall to treacherous, wicked people who do not fear Allah. Rather, they take whatever wealth they can and claim that less was collected or more was disbursed, as is well known of many entrusted with government funds. Yet some of what these people do may be based on an interpretation, unlike an agent, a partner, the manager of a profit-sharing partnership, an orphan’s guardian, the administrator of an endowment, and others like them.

That being so, if someone entrusted with property jointly owned by himself and his partner is credited with the amounts taken from him for these levies, then he has an even stronger claim to be credited with what zakat collectors take in the name of zakat, even if they take more than is due without any interpretive justification—especially since this