Whether one can give monetary value of expiation to somebody who then feeds poor on their behalf

15-5-2017 | IslamWeb

Question:

I live in France. I have to feed sixty poor people. Frankly, I do not know poor people here. Can I give the monetary value of the food to a mosque around here? Would it be permissible to send the money to another country or donate it to a charitable organization that supports Palestine?

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Answer:

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, sallallaahu ‘alayhi wa sallam, is His slave and messenger.

Feeding sixty people is required to expiate for breaking one’s fast during the daytime in Ramadan by having sexual intercourse, or for the zhihar oath (a man declaring his wife to be as forbidden to him as his mother). If you are required to observe either type of expiation, then you must know that such expiation subsumes three courses of action that must be taken respectively. First, you have to free a slave. If that is unaffordable, then you must fast two consecutive months. And, if that is unaffordable, then you must feed sixty needy people. You offer each needy person a mudd of a food type that is commonly consumed in your hometown. The mudd is an amount that weighs about 750 gm.

If freeing a slave and fasting are not available or affordable, then you move on to the feeding of the needy. You could feed the needy people yourself. You could also give money to a mosque, one of whose activities is to serve meals to the poor. You could also pay the money to a charitable society and ask them to buy meals and deliver them to the poor on your behalf.

You could also pay the money for the people of Palestine, or send it to the needy in another country than the one in which you live.

Allah knows best.