بِسۡمِ اللهِ الرَّحۡمٰنِ الرَّحِيۡمِ
Inheritance disputes are having a detrimental effect on many families across the UK. This is of particular concern for Muslim families, given the central importance of inheritance in Islamic law and the potential dire consequences of getting it wrong. Unfortunately, many elderly Muslims who require assistance with estate planning delay seeking it until it is too late, by which time their mental faculties have often deteriorated, and many are unable to speak English or read in any language. The short talks in different languages below, using AI, is an attempt to address this issue. Click on any audio to listen.
English
Urdu/ اردو
Punjabi/ پنجابی
Mirpuri/ Potohari
Arabic/ العربية
Gujrati/ ગુજરાતી
Bangla/ বাংলা
Assalāmu ʿalaykum wa raḥmatullāhi wa barakātuh, dear brothers and sisters.
Let me start with a warning from the Prophet Muhammad (ﷺ). He said: "A man may do the deeds of the people of goodness for seventy years, then when he makes his Will, he is unjust in it, so he ends his life with evil deeds and enters Hell. And a man may do the deeds of evil for seventy years, then he is just in his Will, so he ends his life with good deeds and enters Paradise."
That is a frightening warning. How we deal with our wealth at the end of our lives matters enormously to Allah ﷻ. So today is not really about how to write an Islamic Will. It is about how to leave this world having dealt justly with our family, our creditors, and the wealth Allah ﷻ has entrusted to us.
The first question we should ask is: have I properly understood the rights of everyone who will be affected by my death? Allah ﷻ Himself established the rules of inheritance, and immediately after the inheritance verses, He describes these rules as His limits, warning us against transgressing them. So inheritance is not an area where we can simply say, "This seems fair to me," or "This is how our family has always done it." Justice does not mean giving everybody the same. It means giving everybody the right that Allah ﷻ has established for them. We must never deliberately deprive an heir of their entitlement; the Prophet ﷺ warned against exactly this. But there is another dimension to fairness: the whole family dynamics.
Every family has a history.
Perhaps there has been a previous marriage, or one child has already received a substantial gift, or another has cared for an elderly parent for years. Perhaps there is jointly owned property, a family business, or money lent to a relative. None of this changes the Qur'ānic shares but it matters greatly in establishing what actually belongs to the estate, what was genuinely gifted, what remains a debt, and what obligations need settling.
The document may be simple. The family circumstances behind it rarely are. That is why proper advice matters.
Then there is something often overlooked: debt. We tend to ask, "How much will my children inherit?" But perhaps the first question should be, "How much do I owe?"
The Prophet ﷺ warned: "All the sins of a shahīd are forgiven except debt."
Loans, money borrowed from relatives, money owed to others and owed to us, all of it should be recorded. The question isn't only what we leave our family, but what we leave them to deal with. And there is an even more uncomfortable question:
Is all my wealth halal?
We can spend a great deal of time calculating shares while never asking whether every pound in the estate was lawfully acquired. Harām wealth, from ribā, theft, deception, false claims, or unlawful inheritance, does not become halal simply because we die. It is like a debt owed to someone else, and it cannot rightfully be inherited. So preparing a Will is also a chance to ask honestly: where did my wealth come from?
Have I taken anything unjustly?
And if the answer is troubling, we should put it right while we are still alive, far better than leaving our children a financial problem, or wealth that was never rightfully yours. So a Will should establish: what do I own, what do I owe, what belongs to someone else, is my wealth halal, who are my heirs, and what are my family's circumstances? Then we ensure the rights Allah ﷻ has given each person are respected.
A successful Will does more than prevent a court dispute; it creates fairness the family can understand and accept. What is the point of leaving wealth behind if we also leave bitterness?
If children fight one another, if a widow feels wronged, if one child suspects another was secretly favoured? We should aim to leave wealth, but not disputes; inheritance, but not injustice; clarity, not confusion — so that those we leave behind say, "May Allah forgive my father, may Allah forgive my mother," not, "Why did they do this to us?"
The Prophet ﷺ encouraged anyone with something to bequeath not to let even two nights pass without a Will in place. So don't wait until you're ill, don't wait until old age dulls your judgement, and don't assume writing "distribute my estate according to Islamic law" is enough.
So my message is seek proper advice.
May Allah ﷻ help us understand and respect His limits. May He help us put our affairs in order, repay our debts, purify our wealth, and protect every heir from being wronged. And when we leave this world, may He allow our families to remember us with forgiveness, mercy and duʿāʾ, not with anger, bitterness or dispute.
Yā Allah, let our final dealings with our wealth be an act of justice, fairness and obedience to You. Do not allow a lifetime of good deeds to be undermined by injustice at the end of our lives.
Āmīn. Āmīn. Āmīn.
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https://bit.ly/Beyond_an_Islamic_Will
