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Bequeathing one's organs after death

الوصية بالتبرع بالأعضاء بعد الوفاة

A question from an organ-donation awareness initiative about a person bequeathing all his organs for donation after death, in which Jordan's General Iftaa Department answered that donating organs after death to relieve harm to others is permitted by the sharia, counting it as cooperation in righteousness. The Department answered that God commanded cooperation in righteousness and piety, quoting al-Mawardi's Adab al-Dunya wa-l-Din that joining piety with righteousness brings together God's pleasure and people's. It said that a person's donating one of his organs at death to relieve harm to another is permitted by the sharia, falling under two agreed maxims: necessity makes the prohibited permissible, and necessity is measured by its extent. It cited hadiths on relieving people's distress, said that a patient's need for an organ, or a blind person's need for sight, is greater than a poor person's need for money, and said that whoever bequeaths a donation to serve needy patients ends his life with a noble deed. It noted that the Department had earlier issued fatwas permitting organ donation, including one on donating the cornea, and praised Jordanian doctors' success in transplanting corneas, skin and other organs.

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Summary

A question from an organ-donation awareness initiative about a person bequeathing all his organs for donation after death, in which Jordan's General Iftaa Department answered that donating organs after death to relieve harm to others is permitted by the sharia, counting it as cooperation in righteousness. 1

The question

An initiative to spread awareness of organ donation asked for the ruling on a person making a will to donate all his organs after death. 1

The answer

The Department answered that God commanded cooperation in righteousness and piety, quoting al-Mawardi's Adab al-Dunya wa-l-Din that joining piety with righteousness brings together God's pleasure and people's. 1 It said that a person's donating one of his organs at death to relieve harm to another is permitted by the sharia, falling under two agreed maxims: necessity makes the prohibited permissible, and necessity is measured by its extent. 1 It cited hadiths on relieving people's distress, said that a patient's need for an organ, or a blind person's need for sight, is greater than a poor person's need for money, and said that whoever bequeaths a donation to serve needy patients ends his life with a noble deed. 1 It noted that the Department had earlier issued fatwas permitting organ donation, including one on donating the cornea, and praised Jordanian doctors' success in transplanting corneas, skin and other organs. 1

About this record

Jordan's General Iftaa Department published this fatwa on aliftaa.jo as no. 3895, dated 4 July 2024. 1 The museum records this text as a historical document attributed to the body or scholar that issued it; it issues no ruling of its own.

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Wasiyya (bequest, fiqh)· Seeking treatment (tadawi)

People and things also explored

A charity using zakat to treat patients· Bone and tissue grafts from a dead human or an animal in dental implants· Using cow blood to make a medical preparation· Exchanging surplus medicines dispensed under health insurance· Cloning plants· Adding urea to moisturising creams· Wearing energy stones· Does anaesthesia break ablution?

Sources

  1. Jordan's General Iftaa Department (aliftaa.jo) , fatwa 3895

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islam.museum contributors. “Bequeathing one's organs after death”. islam.museum, https://islam.museum/en/work/fatwa-aliftaa-jo-bequeathing-ones-organs-after-death/. CC BY-SA 4.0. Last updated 2026-11-01.

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A charity using zakat to treat patients

A question about a charity taking zakat to treat patients, buy medicines and equipment and fund health projects, in which Jordan's General Iftaa Department answered that zakat may not be spent on buying medicines, equipment or health projects, but may cover poor Muslims' treatment costs through their agency, while the state may spend it in whatever way best benefits the poor. The Department answered that the recipients of zakat are fixed in the verse on alms in Surat al-Tawba, and that zakat may not be paid to buy medicines and medical equipment or to cover laboratory costs and health projects; but spending it on poor Muslims and their treatment costs, not on general administrative or operating expenses, is unobjectionable. It said a hospital or centre may obtain an agency from the poor under which it receives the money on their behalf and then spends it on them, because zakat in principle must be put into the poor person's ownership; the exception is a government body, since the ruler may spend zakat on the poor in the way he judges most beneficial. It cited the jurists' view that the ruler may buy the poor person a property to draw income from, quoting al-Zarkashi as reported in Mughni al-Muhtaj, the gloss of al-Jamal on Sharh al-Manhaj that the ruler acts for the poor in receiving zakat, and Ibn Hajar al-Haytami in Tuhfat al-Muhtaj that he may bind the poor person not to dispose of what was bought, for the public interest. It noted that the Jordanian Iftaa Council decided in its resolution no. 99 that zakat may be used to help poor Muslim cancer patients, and closed with the hadith of Mu'adh that alms are taken from the Muslims' rich and returned to their poor.