Practices
Khums
Charitable Practices
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Origin 610 to 900 CE
A fifth part, and in Twelver Shia practice a standing religious tax distinct from zakat and much more consequential in the life of the community. Quran 8:41 assigns a fifth of what is gained to God, the Messenger, near relatives, orphans, the needy and the traveller. The Sunni schools read the verse as concerning the spoils of war, and treat khums outside that context as applying at most to buried treasure and mined wealth; it plays almost no part in ordinary Sunni religious life.
Twelver Shia jurisprudence reads the word ghanimtum in the verse as gain in general, and applies khums to the annual surplus of income after living expenses, at twenty per cent. The amount is divided into two halves. One half, the portion of the Imam, is paid to the marja whose rulings the payer follows and is spent by his office on seminaries, stipends and religious institutions; the other half goes to sayyids, descendants of the Prophet, who in Shia law may not receive zakat.
The consequence is institutional rather than merely fiscal. Khums funds an independent Shia clerical establishment that does not depend on state salaries, and the standing of a marja is measurable in the khums directed to him. No Sunni institution is financed this way.
Facts
Practice
Category of PracticeKhums, a religious levy of one fifth on certain categories of income, is a distinctive obligation of Twelver Shi'i practice, historically directed in part to the support of the clergy and the descendants of the Prophet. 1 Who Performs ItAll adherents of the tradition 1 ObligationObligatory on those who meet its conditions 1Tradition: Shia Islam Solitary or CommunalPerformed alone or together 1 Origins
Origin Period Place of OriginMecca and Medina, Arabia 1 Quran 8:41 assigns the fifth explicitly; its distinctive Twelver Shia institutional form developed later. Meaning
Literal MeaningKhums literally means a fifth part, naming the fraction of annual gain the tax assesses. 2 Attributions
TraditionShia Islam, an annual obligatory religious levy of one fifth of certain categories of surplus income, distinct from the Sunni observed zakat. 1 Status
Status TodayLiving tradition, practised today 3 Scholarship and Forensics
Scholarly NoteKhums funds an independent Shia clerical establishment that does not depend on state salaries, and the standing of a marja is measurable in the khums directed to his office. 3 Learn More
The Fifth
Khums, literally the fifth, is an obligatory religious levy of one fifth, most fully developed in Twelver Shia Islam, where it stands beside zakat as a distinct and major duty. Its scriptural warrant is the Qur'anic verse assigning a fifth of gains to God, the Messenger, his kinsfolk, the orphans, the needy and the wayfarer. Sunni jurisprudence has generally applied this narrowly to the spoils of war and to treasure and mined wealth; Twelver Shia jurisprudence reads it far more broadly, levying the fifth on the annual surplus of a person's income after ordinary living expenses, as well as on mined wealth, treasure, and certain other categories.
This broad application makes khums, in Shia practice, an annual audit of one's net savings comparable in weight to the income obligations of other faiths, and it is a principal means by which the religious establishment is funded independently of the state.
The Portion of the Imam
Khums is classically divided into two halves. One half is the sahm al-sada, the portion of the descendants of the Prophet, distributed to those of his lineage who are in need and who, being barred from receiving zakat, are provided for through khums instead. The other half is the sahm al-Imam, the Portion of the Imam. In the absence of the awaited twelfth Imam, held by Twelver doctrine to be in occultation, this portion is entrusted to the most learned jurists, the grand marja, who administer it on the Imam's behalf.
This arrangement has profound institutional consequences. The revenue funds the seminaries of Najaf and Qom, supports students and scholars, and underwrites religious and charitable works, giving the senior Shia clergy a financial base answerable to the faithful rather than to governments. The believer typically pays khums to the marja they follow or that scholar's authorised agents, and the practice is thus central not only to Shia piety but to the independence and structure of Shia religious authority.
Cross-Tradition Connections
Belongs to Tradition
Khums as a standing tax on annual surplus income is specifically Twelver Shia. The Sunni schools confine the fifth of Quran 8:41 to war booty and, for most, to treasure and mined wealth.
Held Differently
In Hanafi law khums is the fifth of the spoils of war set aside in the Quran, not the standing annual levy on surplus wealth that the Jafari school makes of it.
In Hanbali law khums is the fifth of the spoils of war set aside in the Quran, not a standing annual levy on surplus wealth.
In Maliki law khums is the fifth of the spoils of war set aside in the Quran, not a standing annual levy on surplus wealth.
In Shafii law khums is the fifth of the spoils of war set aside in the Quran, not a standing annual levy on surplus wealth.
Element Of
Khums, a fifth of annual surplus after expenses, is a standing obligation in Twelver law, half of it to the descendants of the Prophet and half at the disposal of the source of emulation. No Sunni school levies it this way.
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