Either pay zakat or buy a diamond?

In the Name of Allah, the Most Beneficent, the Most Merciful,

All praise is due to Allah, All wise,

If I say something wrong, it is from my ego, but If I am correct, it is from Allah.

On Last Sunday, I was given a scolding that times have changed and we should re-examine the rulings of Islam according to new times, and disallow women from entering masjid, although it goes against a direct command of Allah. However, when trying to learn about Zakat, I came across a ruling. Same folks would allow hiding wealth in diamonds because Quran did not list Diamond with gold and silver. So, their logical mind goes to sleep when it comes to going against the status quo.

Oh Come on people! Do you think you can fool Allah by hiding your wealth in Diamonds, so you don't have to pay Zakat. What an absurd ruling. Lets look at this hypocritical ruling from the current scholars.

"And those who hoard up gold and silver and do not spend them in the way of God, announce unto them a painful punishment. One day that (treasure) will be heated up in the fire of hell and their foreheads, their sides, and their backs will be branded with it: “This is the treasure that you hoarded up for yourselves. Now taste what you used to hoard up". (Quran 9:34)

Many scholars quote this verse as part of the evidence that there is zakah on gold and silver. But it seems clear that here gold and silver are mentioned merely as age-old symbols and forms of wealth. If at any time wealth could be possessed in other forms, the obligation to spend out of it in the way of God would still apply. Today wealth can be possessed in the form of paper money and diamonds, so believers are duty bound to spend out of this wealth in the way of God. It would be a very superficial interpretation of the verse to say that if we have gold or silver worth $2000 we should spend out of it in the way of God but if we have a million dollars in paper money or an equivalent amount in diamonds, then we have no obligation to spend out of it anything in the way of God.

To interpret the verse (9:34) by restricting it entirely to gold and silver would be like insisting that we should always use horses to build our armed forces, since God says:

And make ready for them whatever you can of (military) force, including steeds of war, to deter the enemy of God and your enemy, and others whom you may not know but God knows. (Quran 8:60)

Here God has mentioned horses because in the time of the Holy Prophet they greatly enhanced the fighting power of an army. Today, of course, horses would not deter any of the numerous enemies of Islam and Muslims, armed to the teeth with weapons of mass destruction. Most scholars would agree that today the commandment in 8:60 requires us to acquire weapons like tanks, war planes, missiles, and nuclear weapons[2]. Similarly, 9:34 should be interpreted to mean that we should spend in the way of God out of whatever wealth we possess, be it gold or silver or some other form of wealth.

Today wealth clearly includes diamonds, for, wealth may be defined as what we possess of money or of items that are bought and sold often enough to acquire a market value. Today diamonds and many other precious stones are clearly items that have a determinable market value.

Thus the letter and the spirit of the Qur`an suggests that in our age diamonds are subject to zakah.

Turning now to the Sunnah/Hadith, we note that there is no authentic hadith stating that precious stones are not subject to zakah. Fiqh al-Sunnah does not mention any such hadith. Mufti Muhammad Taqi Usmani, however, quotes the hadith:

(“There is no zakah on a stone”).

But he mentions no source for it and does not say whether the hadith is sahih or not. The fact is that this hadith is absent from almost all the books of ahadith, including such sahih collections as Bukhari and Muslim. In view of this, the probability is very high that it has been falsely attributed to the Holy Prophet.

[I extracted this argument from this source http://www.islamicperspectives.com/zakah-diamonds.htm it seems well written and to the point]

I would like to appeal to you to think for a second that if diamonds have a resale value today, and people transfer their wealth from gold into diamonds, does that mean that we have found a loop hole in Allah's wisdom? After all people have been forced to pay zakat in the past, but if the precious stone were exempt from the Zakat, Qaroon would have done that, and Abu Bakar (RA) would have been looking at the piles of diamonds instead of a war for zakat.

Please do not be fooled into not paying zakat on items that are not a neccessity and worth above Nisab. If anyone can provide the source of the above hadith, may be we can reconsider the exception, but until then pay your zakat on precious stones.

And Allah knows best.

JazakAllah Khairin

A reasonable person.

AbuArman Jumani