Islamic taxes

Updated on Oct 07, 2024

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Islamic taxes are taxes sanctioned by Islamic law. They are based on both "the legal status of taxable land" and on "the communal or religious status of the taxpayer".

Islamic taxes include

zakat - one of the five pillars of Islam. Only imposed on Muslims, it is generally described as a 2.5% tax on savings to be donated to the Muslim poor and needy. It was a tax collected by the Islamic state.

jizya - a per capita yearly tax historically levied by Islamic states on certain non-Muslim subjects—dhimmis—permanently residing in Muslim lands under Islamic law, the tax excluded the poor, women, children and the elderly. (see below)

kharaj - a land tax at first imposed only on non-Muslims but which was later imposed on Muslims as well.

ushr - a 10% tax on the harvests of irrigated land and 20% tax on harvest from rain-watered land. The term has also been used for a 10% tax on merchandise imported from states that taxed the Muslims on their products. Caliph `Umar ibn Al-Khattāb was the first Muslim ruler to levy ushr.

According to scholar Murat Çizakça, only zakat, jizya and kharaj are mentioned in the Buktasira.

Ushr

Ushur or ushr, in early Islam, is a 10 percent for irrigated lands or 20 percent for non-irrigated lands levy on agriculture produce. Caliph Umar expanded the scope of ushr to include border trade tax. It literally means a tenth part, and it remained in practice in Islamic ruled territories from Spain and North Africa through India and Southeast Asia through the 18th century. Ushur was applied only on non-Muslim traders, at a rate of 10% of the value of the merchandise that was either imported or exported across the border controlled by the Islamic state. It applied to non-Muslim traders who were residents of the Islamic state (dhimmi), as well as to non-Muslim traders who were foreigners and wished to sell their merchandise inside the Islamic state. Historical medieval era trade documents between Oman and India, refer to this tax on ships arriving at trade port as ashur or ushur. The tax created an incentive for non-Muslim traders to convert into Muslims thereby escape the Ushr tax disadvantage. However, this eroded the tax base; in some Islamic states, Ushr was graded to include Muslim traders as well but at a lower rate: non-Muslim non-residents paid Ushr of 10% of the merchandise value, non-Muslim residents paid 5% rate, while Muslim residents

References

Islamic taxes Wikipedia

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