QUESTION
According
to the hadeeth, "The child is
property of the bed, and the fornicator gets the stone,"
[1] and the hadeeth, "Whoever
fornicates with a free woman or a slave, then the child is
a child of zinaa, it neither inherits nor does the
man inherit from it," [2] is the child of
zinaa conidered to be the man's child in any way?
I
mean the hadeeth obviously says that there is no inheritance,
but can the child of zinaa take the man's name or can
he be treated like the man's child in some ways? Is the child
considered to have any biological connection to the man in
Islaam?
ANSWER
by Shaykh Wasee Allaah 'Abbaas, lecturer at the Ka'bah, instructor
at Umm Al-Quraa University in Makkah
The
child of zinaa is not considered the offspring of the
man in any way. He does not take his name. He may not be named
"So-and-So, the son of 'Abdullaah (the fornicator)"
for example.
The
child does not inherit from the man, nor does the man inherit
from the child. This is the actual meaning of the hadeeth:
"...and
the fornicator gets the stone (i.e. nothing)"
[3]
However,
if the mother is married or she is a slave whose owner has
intercourse with her, then the child is considered the legitimate
offspring of them (i.e. the man and his wife or the man and
his slave), biologically and Islaamically. In this case, the
child gets every right that every other child has, unless,
in the case of a slave woman, there is a clear, undoubtable
resemblance in the child to the fornicator. In that case,
the child, out of piety, should have the other other daughters
and wives of his mother's owner cover properly when he is
around them. [4]
FOOTNOTES
[1]
Saheeh Al-Bukhaaree #6749 (12/38 of Fat-hul-Baaree)
and Saheeh Muslim #3598 (5/279 of Sharh An-Nawawee).
[2]
Saheeh Sunan At-Tirmithee #2113
[3]
Al-Haafith Ibn Hajr (may Allaah have Mercy on him) said, "The
'Arabs say about the one who is deprived: 'For him is the
stone' and 'In his mouth is the stone and dust'
and the likes. It is also said that "the
stone" here means that he is stoned to death.
An-Nawawee said it is a weak opinion, as when he is stoned,
it does not negate that the child is his. This hadeeth is
specifically negating the relationship between the man and
the child." See Fat-hul-Baaree (12/43).
[4]
An example of this is found in the hadeeth of 'Abd Ibnu Zam'ah
referred to in FOOTNOTE [1].
SOURCE
This
was translated exclusively for www.bakkah.net from a handwritten
answer provided by the shaykh, file no. AAWA013, dated 1423/7/20.
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