The portions of zakat: fractions and percents

Recalling common equivalents between fractions, decimals and percents, through the fixed portions in zakat.

Lesson 3 of 3 3 of 5 in the course

Course map

Draft: this lesson was written with AI help and has not yet been read by a human editor.

What your class asks

This lesson asks you to understand and recall commonly used percents, fractions and decimal equivalents. The museum offers one context, the fixed portions in zakat, and no worked problems; the other contexts are for your class to bring. 1

Curriculum expectations, with their official codes

  • B2.2 understand and recall commonly used percents, fractions, and decimal equivalents

The lesson

Which fraction does each portion name?

Start from the fraction each portion names, then write it as a decimal number and as a percent. Compare the portions the record names: which is largest, and by how many times?

Go deeper

The jurists define zakat as the transfer of a fixed portion of a defined wealth to a defined recipient 2 3. The portions themselves are set down in a book. Abu'l-Wafa' al-Maraghi lists the thresholds in his Qadaya: twenty mithqals of gold and two hundred dirhams of silver, at a quarter-tenth 4; and a fifth on minerals and buried treasure 5. The museum restates one author's list and nothing more. Turning each portion into a decimal and a percent is your class's work.

Think about it

The list names a kind of wealth first and a portion second: gold and silver at one portion, minerals and buried treasure at another. Using one example from the record, why does a list of portions need to name the kind of wealth before it names the portion?

Into the museum

  • Zakat (alms tax): the definition, the thresholds and the rates, as the record gives them.
  • Sadaqa: a word that, in the jurists' usage, covers zakat and also voluntary alms.
  • Saving (idkhar): how the jurists treat wealth whose zakat is unpaid.

Try this

Read Zakat (alms tax). Make a table with the fraction, the decimal and the percent for each portion the record names, and learn those equivalents.

Check yourself

Nothing here is marked or sent anywhere. It is for you.

Which of these did you meet in this lesson?

Not in this lesson. Look again at the cards above.

Yes. That is the one from this lesson.

Not in this lesson. Look again at the cards above.

In your own words: what does Zakat (alms tax) have to do with this lesson?

Compare with the card

Fixed portions of wealth. The jurists define zakat as the transfer of a fixed portion of a defined wealth to a defined recipient. Abu al-Wafa al-Maraghi lists the thresholds and rates in his Qadaya: twenty mithqals of gold and two hundred dirhams of silver, at a quarter-tenth; a tenth on rain-fed crops and half of it on irrigated ones; and a fifth on minerals and buried treasure. What percent is each of these portions?

I can now

Notes

  1. 1. Ontario Ministry of Education, The Ontario Curriculum: Mathematics
  2. 2. Issues of Work and Wealth in Islam — Abu al-Wafa al-Maraghi, p. 43
  3. 3. Issues of Work and Wealth in Islam — Abu al-Wafa al-Maraghi, p. 45
  4. 4. Issues of Work and Wealth in Islam — Abu al-Wafa al-Maraghi, p. 46
  5. 5. Issues of Work and Wealth in Islam — Abu al-Wafa al-Maraghi, p. 47
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