Burying the dead in a coffin inside the grave

A question about placing the dead in a coffin out of necessity and burying him with it, in which Shaykh Ibn Baz answered that the body is taken out of the coffin and laid in the niche of the grave if taking it out causes no harm, but if it would hurt people and its smell would distress them, it is buried in the coffin and that suffices. ¹

The questioner asked about placing the dead in a coffin, as is sometimes done out of necessity, for a drowned person or one whose body has begun to decay, and then asked: but is he buried in the grave together with the coffin? ¹

The Shaykh answered that a drowned person carried from one country to another is placed in the grave, and there is no harm in that. ¹ Asked about burying him with the coffin, he said that if taking him out is feared to harm people he is not taken out, and if it does no harm he is taken out and laid in the niche, whereas if taking him out would hurt people and his smell would distress them, he is buried in the coffin and that suffices; he closed by asking God to grant everyone success and soundness of intention and action. ¹

The answer is published on binbaz.org.sa, the official site of Ibn Baz's legacy, as fatwa 4015, filed under carrying and burying the dead, with no date on the page. ¹ The museum records this text as a historical document attributed to the body or scholar that issued it; it issues no ruling of its own.