Dear respected Sha ykh, assalamu alaikum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh. Is it permissible to give Zakat to relatives? هل يجوز دفع الزكاة للأقارب؟

Praise be to Allah, and may Allah’s peace and blessings be upon the Messenger of Allah, his family and his companions. Wa alaikum assalam wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh. As to what follows: In response to your question, we say:     If a person’s relative is poor and he is from the eight categories of people who are allowed to receive  Zakat then he can be given Zakat. However, if it is compulsory to provide for the expenditure of the relatives then it is not permissible to give them Zakat, because that involves making a compulsory duty fall away by engaging in another compulsory duty, and that is wrong. Zakat in this case can be only given by a person who cannot provide for these relatives, or the one whose expenditure for them cannot cover their needs, like a person who has some expenditure for his relatives but he cannot provide for all their needs. In this case he can give them Zakat to cover for the shortfall in expenditure which happened because of his deficiency, weakness and inability. For example if a person has a brother who will not inherit him after his death, he is permitted to give him Zakat because it is not compulsory to provide for him. If a person’s father is alive- and a person inherits from his father and vice-versa- in this situation it is not permitted to give the father Zakat even if he is poor, even if the son cannot cover the father’s needs because it is compulsory to provide for the father if he is weak and incapable of earning.