Assalamu alaikum. My uncle gave my father some money as advance to build a house for him (Uncle) . I needed a laptop. So my father used this money to buy me a laptop intending that he will repay it after sometime. I have three questions related to this matter: 1. Is it a sin if my father uses this money without my uncle's permission?2. Some scholars said that the profit got by using the money should be given to the owner. Is it true?. 3. If I do dawah using this laptop who will be rewarded( Me/Father/Uncle)?

All perfect praise be to Allah, The Lord of the Worlds. I testify that there is none worthy of worship except Allah, and that Muhammad is His slave and Messenger.

We have issued several fatwas regarding the ruling on borrowing from a deposit of money (i.e., money that is entrusted to you) without the permission [consent] of its owner. And we have mentioned that borrowing from it (i.e. using it) can be either disliked or forbidden. It is forbidden if the borrower is destitute and cannot repay it, and it is disliked if he is rich and able to repay it. If your father is able to pay it off, then he has committed a disliked act and there is no sin on him, but if he is not able to pay it off then he is sinful, and in both cases, he must guarantee (be liable for) that money and return the same amount.

Other scholars held that the prohibition or the dislikeability is based on the knowledge of the condition of the depositor. If it is known that he does not mind borrowing from it, then there is nothing wrong with it. Otherwise, it is not permissible to borrow from it without his permission.

This is what Sheikh Al-Islam Ibn Taymiyyah issued in a fatwa when he was asked, “about borrowing from the deposit without the permission of its owner.”

As for the question about the resulting profit, is it to be given to the owner of the deposit? It seems that you want to base your other question on it, which is who gets the reward for doing da’wah using the device based on the sayings of the Muslim jurists regarding who gets the profit if it were to be traded with it? If this is what you are asking about, then we did not come across a saying of the Muslim jurists regarding using the deposited money in da’wah, for whom will its reward be? And we hope that you all will be rewarded for the Da'wah, although it appears to us that the reward for Da'wah is for the one who carries out Da'wah and seeks its reward. The Messenger of Allah said: “There is no reward except with anticipation (i.e. to get closer to Allah and fulfill His order) and there is no work except with intention (i.e. for the sake of Allah).” Reported by Al-Dailami, and Al-Albani authenticated it with its shawaahid (plural of shaahid, i.e. a hadeeth with a closely similar meaning reported from a different Companion through a different chain of narrators).

Al-Minawi said in Fayd al-Qadeer: “There is no reward except with anticipation,” that is, for the intention of seeking reward from Allah, and there is no deed except with the intention.

As for the profit resulting from trading with the deposited money without the depositor’s permission, the Muslim jurists have five opinions regarding it, the first of which is: That the profit belongs to the depositor because it is the growth of his property, and the second: it belongs to bayt al-maal (the treasury), and the third is that it must be given in charity. The fourth is that the profit belongs to the depository (the one entrusted with the deposit), as it is the fruit of his work and effort, and the fifth is that the profit is between the depositor and the one entrusted with the deposit according to the amount of the two benefits, according to the knowledge of the people of experience, and they divide it between them like a mudarabah (partnership). This is a summary of the sayings of the Muslim jurists in this regard.

Allah knows best.