even were the ruler, at some time, to find it necessary to conciliate an unbeliever whose benefit is hoped for and whose hostility is feared, it would be permissible to give him something from the zakah funds. When a person distributes his own zakah, the share normally allotted to those employed to administer it is no longer due.
As for the poor (fuqarāʾ) and the destitute (masākīn), no explicit text distinguishes between them, and Mālik’s legal theory shows that he regarded them as one and the same: anyone who possesses assets that do not cover his living expenses. Some hold that the faqīr is in a worse plight than the miskīn, while others say that the miskīn is the poorer of the two.
Those employed over the zakah—that is, the agents who collect and levy it—are given from it a known wage proportionate to their labour. They may not be hired for a percentage of the collection, for the exact amount is unknown at the time of contract.
Concerning the words ‘and for freeing captives,’ the intent is the emancipation of slaves. The imam may purchase slaves with zakah revenues and set them free, in which case their walāʾ (clientage) belongs to the Muslim community. If the zakah-payer himself buys and manumits them, that too is valid. This is the distilled position of Mālik.
It is likewise transmitted from Mālik, in the Madinan narration and in the report of Ziyād from him, that a mukātab (contracted slave) may be assisted from these funds to complete the payments that will secure his freedom; most scholars construe Allah’s words, ‘and for freeing captives’ (Q 9:60), in this manner.
The debtors (ghārimūn) are those whose liabilities equal or exceed their assets, having incurred them for an obligatory or permissible purpose. Such people may receive from the zakah enough to settle their debts, in whole or in part. If they possess no assets at all, they are ‘poor debtors’ and qualify under both descriptions, yet we do not grant them two separate shares, for in our view zakah is not divided into eight fixed portions or the like.
The verse merely identifies those for whom alms are lawful; accordingly, whoever channels his zakah to any one of the categories named by Allah has discharged his obligation.
As for His words, ‘and in the path of Allah,’ they refer to the warriors (ghuzāt).