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Paying Khums and Zakat for the first time

Q:

Salaams,

I hope you are well.

I am a Khoja Shia Ithna-Asheri looking to pay his Khums and Zakaat for the first time. Having read the Khums guide on the World Federation website, I am confused as to how to go about matters, especially the fact that I ideally should have paid Khums and Zakaat before(or at the very least, deduced whether I needed to pay it, even if it has not been necessary for myself).

A:

Wa Alaykum al-Salam

Thank you very much for your question.

There is one principle in such worship acts, and that is “the obligation comes on one when the responsibility matures” based on this, you are only obliged to pay your Khums after excluding your “Mauna” (yearly expenses) in a specified time of the year. (Option, you can select any day and that will be your Khums year.) and in the Wajib Zakat is when you have related subjects with yourself. (*1 below.)

When do I pay khums?
By Allah’s grace on His creation, khums is not payable immediately. Rather, you have a choice of either paying khums when you receive an income or postponing it until the end of the khums year having deducted all allowable expenses for that year from your income; you would then pay khums on the remaining amount, i.e. on your surplus income.
The date of your khums payments can be based on either the Islamic or the Gregorian calendar.

Deciding on the year-end will depend on your personal circumstances. If you are not working to earn a living – for example, you are retired, a housewife, a student, or unemployed – then every income and gain will have its own period for a year. For example, if you receive a gift of £100 today, then khums will be payable on whatever remains of that £100 in a year’s time from now.
If you are earning a living by means of a job, you will have a single year-end date for all incomes; that date will be the day you started work.
Note: Based on obligatory precaution, khums is payable immediately on any income which you know you will not use until the end of the year.

To my understanding, bolded part of the WF Khums document above, is where you question is. For this I called the office of Agha here too, the Office insisted on the same principle. That is, Khums becomes wajib on specified time. But for if you are sure that certain portion of subject to Khums won’t be used, what you can do is pay before time. Another example is; you bought something that may be used after 3 years. For such cases paying of Khums is matured. So ehtiyatan (ehtiyate wajib-not fatwa.) if you pay in such cases before specified time, you are in safe hands.

1(*1) Question: If I save an amount of money throughout the whole year I know that I have to pay Khums from it. What about Zakat? Should I give Zakat from the amount also?
Answer: Zakat is not obligatory in that. Zakat should be given from the following items: Wheat, Barley, Dates, Raisins, Coined Gold & Silver, Camel, Cow, Sheep (including goat)
https://www.sistani.org/english/qa/01358/

Iltimase dua
S.S.Jaffery