The Earliest Muslim Rulers Provided for Poor, Elderly, Unemployed Non-Muslims
ʿUmar ibn al-Khaṭṭāb (Allah be pleased with him) once passed by a house where a Jewish man was begging, saying, “help an elderly, blind man.” ʿUmar (Allah be pleased with him) asked him, “What has compelled you to beg?” The man replied, “Poverty and the jizya [personal tax for non-Muslims].” ʿUmar (Allah be pleased with him) took the man by his hand to his home and fulfilled some of his needs. He then sent for the Caretaker of the Bayt al-Māl [Treasury] and said to him, “Take care of this man and others like him, for, by Allah, we will not have been just if we consume his [wealth during his] youth and then forsake him in his old age.” He then recited the following verse: ﴾Alms [Zakāh] are meant only for the poor, the needy, those who administer it, those whose hearts need winning over, to free slaves, to help those in debt, and for Allah’s cause, and for travellers in need. This is ordained by Allah; Allah is All-Knowing, All-Wise.﴿ [9:60] ʿUmar (Allah be pleased with him) then said, “‘The poor’ meant in this verse are the Muslims. This man is from ‘the needy’ of the People of the Book.” He then exempted him and others like him from paying the jizya.[1]
In the agreement of dhimma [protection] with the non-Muslims of Ḥīra, Khālid ibn al-Walīd (Allah be pleased with him) wrote: ‘Any elderly person who is too weak to work; or has been afflicted; or was once wealthy but has now became poor such that he is need of charity from his co-religionists; such a person is exempt from the jizya and as long as he is a resident of Muslim lands he and his family are to be supported from the Muslim Treasury.’[2]
ʿUmar ibn ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz wrote to ʿAdī ibn Arṭaʾa (Allah have mercy on them): ‘Pay attention to those non-Muslims living under your rule who have grown old, weak and are unemployed. Give them from the Muslim Treasury that which fulfils their needs.”[3]
Sources:
1 Narrated by Abū Yūsuf in al-Kharāj
2 Narrated by Abū Yūsuf in al-Kharāj
3 Narrated by Ibn ʿUbayd in Kitāb al-Amwāl
