Investment of zakat funds in islamic law

The issue of investment of zakat funds is a current issue that has not been addressed in the classical fiqh literature that has emerged nowadays and in the fiqh acquis until recently. Some methodological problems stand out in the issue of zakat investment. The most important of these is the disagreement about whether the order of zakat denotes fawr or tarakhi, and the condition of assignment in the performance of zakat. In addition, the issues of sharing the profit or benefit obtained as a result of investment and compensation liability in case of loss also raise questions on the subject. Zakat can be invested by the beneficiary, zakat payer, intermediary institutions, the state, or persons or institutions in the position of regent, which are parties to zakat. To make a fiqh analysis of the subject, it is very important what the roles of these parties are in terms of zakat worship and whether they have the authority to investment. However, assuming that the issue of investment zakat is permissible, the questions of which classes of funds will be used for this activity or which methods will be followed are also important. Many opinions for and against the subject have been expressed by the leading scholars of our time. However, the issue was discussed and its decisions were published by Islamic Fiqh academies and fatwa committees of various countries. In this study, first of all, the methodological problems related to the investment of zakat funds have been comprehensively examined, and then the roles of the persons or institutions that are party to zakat and their authority on investment have been evaluated. In addition, within the framework of the aforementioned views and fatwas, those who argue that the issue is permissible or not permissible, and the evidence they put forward has been examined and evaluated. However, the conditions put forward for the issue to be permissible are also given under the headings of conditions for practice and nature. There are practices regarding the investment of zakat funds by the zakat institutions operating in various Islamic countries and the leading charitable societies of our country. In this context, the examples of Algeria, Sudan, Malaysia, and Turkey were examined. As a result, our subject is an application for the benefit of the right holders, which has legal foundations in the theoretical sense but also has a practical counterpart. Increasing the zakat fund through financial instruments in the short and medium-term, supporting microfinance projects for beneficiaries, providing employment to beneficiaries by implementing production and service projects, and fulfillment of their needs, are considered within the scope of investment of zakat funds.