Vol 3, No 1 (2022) 1–11

 

Explor­ing the Halal Per­spec­tives on Ani­mal Excre­ment and Its Renew­able Ener­gy Products

Ahmad Munjin Nasih1, Nur Faizin1, Eli Hen­drik San­jaya1, Achmad Sul­toni1, Cecep Soleh Kur­ni­awan2

1 Uni­ver­si­tas Negeri Malang, Jl. Semarang No. 5 Malang, East Java, Indonesia

2 Uni­ver­si­ti Islam Sul­tan Sharif Ali, Sim­pang 347, Jalan Pasar Gadong, Ban­dar Seri Begawan, Brunei

Cor­re­spon­dence should be addressed to Ahmad Munjin Nasih; munjin.​nasih.​fs@​um.​ac.​id, Nur Faizin; nur.​faizin.​fs@​um.​ac.​id, Eli Hen­drik San­jaya; eli.​hendrik.​fmipa@​um.​ac.​id, Achmad Sul­toni; achmad.​sultoni.​fs@​um.​ac.​id, Cecep Soleh Kur­ni­awan; soleh.​kurniawan@​unissa.​edu.​bn

 

Cite this: Nusan­tara Halal J. 2022, Vol. 3 No.1 pp. 1–11 (Arti­cle) | Received 24 March 2022 | Revised 3 May 2022 | Accept­ed 16 June 2022 | Pub­lished 30 June 2022 | http://​dx​.doi​.org/​1​0​.​1​7​9​7​7​/​u​m​0​6​0​.​2​0​2​2​v​3​p​0​0​1​-​011

Abstract

Ener­gy con­sump­tion con­tin­ues to increase fol­low­ing the esca­la­tion of eco­nom­ic growth world­wide. The U.S. Ener­gy Infor­ma­tion Admin­is­tra­tion pre­dicts glob­al ener­gy con­sump­tion will increase by 50% from 2018 to 2050, with the high­est increase in Asia. But up to recent­ly, coal and oil are still the pri­ma­ry sources of ener­gy. Thus, a nov­el and renew­able alter­na­tive ener­gy is a neces­si­ty. Bio­mass is one of the most abun­dant renew­able ener­gy sources that come from var­i­ous sources. How­ev­er, the Mus­lim world pop­u­la­tion feels the need for an answer to the halal sta­tus of this ener­gy source. This paper exam­ines Islam­ic clas­si­cal and mod­ern legal lit­er­a­ture on halal law con­cern­ing bio­mass pro­duc­tion using rit­u­al­ly unclean mate­ri­als such as ani­mal manure, trans­ac­tion, and dis­tri­b­u­tion. This study found many dif­fer­ences in the views of Islam­ic jurists regard­ing bio­mass use, trad­ing, and dis­tri­b­u­tion to the pub­lic. This paper con­cludes that Islam­ic jurists have offered some solu­tions on how Mus­lims can use ani­mal manure that is con­sid­ered excre­ment to become valu­able goods for the ben­e­fit of humans.

Key­words: Islam­ic econ­o­my, Halal con­sumers, Market.

 

 

Introduction

In the last few decades, ener­gy con­sump­tion has con­tin­ued to increase along with increas­ing eco­nom­ic growth. How­ev­er, the world’s ener­gy con­sump­tion declined in 2020 due to the Covid-19 pan­dem­ic [1]. Glob­al ener­gy con­sump­tion has been pre­dict­ed to increase by 50% from 2018 to 2050, with the high­est increase in Asia [2]. Recent­ly, coal and oil remained the pri­ma­ry ener­gy sources, but they are derived from non-renew­able fos­sils. Their num­ber con­tin­ues to decrease, and the price becomes increas­ing­ly expen­sive. There­fore, the use of renew­able ener­gy is a solu­tion that con­tin­ues to be devel­oped and becomes a neces­si­ty as alter­na­tive ener­gy to replace fos­sil-based ener­gy [3]

The use of new and renew­able ener­gy from sun­light, water, wind, bio­mass, ocean waves, and geot­her­mal ener­gy con­tin­ues to be devel­oped, even though the per­cent­age is still small. Accord­ing to the Inter­na­tion­al Ener­gy Agency (IEA), in 2022, new and renew­able alter­na­tive ener­gy is pre­dict­ed to account for 43% of world ener­gy use [4]. Bio­mass is an organ­ic mate­r­i­al derived from liv­ing organ­isms, includ­ing plants, ani­mals, and microor­gan­isms, which usu­al­ly has a com­po­si­tion of cel­lu­lose, lignin, sug­ar, fat, and pro­tein [5]. Bio­mass is one of the most abun­dant renew­able ener­gy sources from var­i­ous sources such as wood, saw­dust, straw, seed, ani­mal manure, paper, house­hold, and waste­water [6]. Ani­mal manure is one of the sources of bio­mass that is not used opti­mal­ly. In fact, ani­mal waste also increas­es along with the increase in the num­ber of farms to meet milk and meat needs. If this is not used wise­ly, it will result in envi­ron­men­tal pol­lu­tion. There­fore, ani­mal manure as an alter­na­tive ener­gy source needs to be opti­mized [7], [8]. In Europe and sev­er­al oth­er coun­tries, such as Japan, ani­mal waste is man­aged into prod­ucts with high-val­ue ben­e­fits, such as fer­til­iz­ers, gas, and elec­tri­cal ener­gy [9], [10]. How­ev­er, in most coun­tries, ani­mal manure is gen­er­al­ly only processed into fer­til­iz­er, and most is thrown away. The prob­lem is even more com­plex in coun­tries with a Mus­lim-major­i­ty pop­u­la­tion. Besides the lim­i­ta­tions of ani­mal waste man­age­ment tech­nol­o­gy, it also involves the spir­i­tu­al dimen­sion. Some Mus­lims have not entire­ly accept­ed the pro­cess­ing of ani­mal manure. This is because ani­mal manure man­age­ment is con­sid­ered con­trary to Islam­ic law. Some Mus­lims believe that ani­mal manure is con­sid­ered rit­u­al­ly unclean (najis), so its man­age­ment, includ­ing buy­ing and sell­ing, dis­tri­b­u­tion, and pro­cess­ing, is haram [11].

For Mus­lims, like food, the issue of the legal­i­ty of using oth­er mate­ri­als is fun­da­men­tal [12], [13]. In the trea­sury of Islam­ic law, changes in the sta­tus of the halal and haram of an item are very depen­dent on the Islam­ic the­o­rem or the under­ly­ing cause. In a preva­lent rule, it is stat­ed that al huk­mu yadu­ru ma’a illi­harai embod­i­ment was adamant (the law of a case depends on the pres­ence or absence of a cause) [14]. This rule pro­vides space to con­duct a more in-depth study of why ani­mal manure has been con­sid­ered najis. Is it because it is some­thing dis­gust­ing? If this is the lead­ing cause, what if the dirt has been processed into oth­er goods so that the lead­ing cause no longer appears and changes? What if processed goods are trad­ed and used by humankind? [15].

Animal excrement in Islam

Ani­mal excre­ment is a unique ener­gy source that can be adopt­ed as alter­na­tive ener­gy. Besides, prop­er ani­mal manure man­age­ment resolves the waste man­age­ment issue in most parts of the world [16]. More­over, bio­gas from organ­ic waste pro­duces renew­able ener­gy and becomes a waste man­age­ment strat­e­gy to main­tain envi­ron­men­tal health.

From the Islam­ic law per­spec­tive, ani­mal manure is per­ceived as najis by most Mus­lim Ula­ma [17]. In Islam­ic law, the rea­son for pro­claimed excre­ment is not def­i­nite. The deter­mi­na­tion of najis? Pro­nounce­ment does not mere­ly rely on its dis­gust­ing lev­el. Some peo­ple may con­sid­er sali­va and snot gross, but the ula­ma does not acknowl­edge it as najis.

Sim­i­lar­ly, manure is not declared mere­ly because some­thing is dirty. Soil is unclear, but in Islam, it is report­ed as rit­u­al­ly clean (sacred) and even can be used to wash up (tayam­mum) and clean the najis, such as najis from dogs and pigs, accord­ing to Safi’i school. There­fore, the najis dec­la­ra­tion most­ly fol­lows the the­o­rem with­in Al-Qur’an.

Islam oblig­ates its adher­ents to do a rit­u­al purifi­ca­tion before they car­ry out reg­u­lar prayers or oth­er reli­gious activ­i­ties. As Allah pro­nounced in Al-Qur’an, “Puri­fy your gar­ments” (Quran 74:4, Keme­nag). Islam sep­a­rates the unclean from najis. The con­t­a­m­i­nat­ed goods are not always declared as najis, such as soil and sperm, which are pro­claimed sacred even if dirty. Besides, the things con­sid­ered najis are not always mud­dy, such as pork and dogs, which remain manure even after being cleaned. Addi­tion­al­ly, some things con­sid­ered dis­gust­ing by some peo­ple are not always najis, such as snot.

The Al-Quran men­tions sev­er­al objects, which Ula­ma lat­er declares as excre­ments, such as in Al-Maid­ah verse 3 and Al-an’am verse 145. This verse says sev­er­al haram objects, some lat­er under­stood as unclean objects, such as car­rion, blood, and dogs. There are no vers­es in Al-Qur’an that have explic­it­ly acknowl­edged ani­mal excre­ment as excre­ment. The rel­a­tive­ly more pre­cise direc­to­ry on ani­mal waste has been iden­ti­fied from sev­er­al hadiths from the Prophet.

As nar­rat­ed, when Prophet Muham­mad went to defe­cate, He asked Ibnu Mas’ud to find three stones. Then, Ibnu Mas’ud brought two stones and one dried dirt. The Prophet took the two stones and threw away the dirt while say­ing that it was rijs/​unclean (HR. Ahmad 3757, Tur­mudzi 17, al-Bai­haqiy) [18]–[20]. The ula­ma pre­sumed that the dirt in the hadith came from dried ani­mal manure, so the Prophet did not use it. Con­trast­ing­ly, anoth­er hadith implies that ani­mal manure is not cat­e­go­rized as najis. The hadith said that The Prophet always prayed when­ev­er the prayer time came, and he once prayed in a goat pen (HR. Bukhari) [21]. 

Aside from the najis sta­tus of ani­mal manure, bio­mass pro­duc­tion faces oth­er essen­tial issues, such as the law on its man­age­ment, com­mer­cial­iza­tion, and distribution.

Ulama’s View on Animal Excrement

The ula­ma has pro­posed dis­tinc­tive opin­ions on ani­mal manure’s sta­tus in Islam­ic law. The first opin­ion states that all ani­mal manure is najis, even from the ani­mal with edi­ble halal meat. This opin­ion most­ly comes from the Ula­ma who believe in Shafi’i school [22] and Hanafi school, except Imam Zufar [23]. The sec­ond opin­ion explains that the manure from an ani­mal with edi­ble halal meat is also halal and sacred. Mean­while, the manure of ani­mals with haram meat is najis. This view­point comes from the Han­abi­lah school of thought and Imam Zufar from Hanafi mad­habs. Mean­while, the Mali­ki school states that the manure from halal ani­mals is divid­ed into sacred and najis based on their food; if they eat halal food, their manure is halal and reli­gious, and vice ver­sa [24].

Unlike the opin­ion from Sun­ni Islam­ic jurispru­dence, the Shi’i ula­ma, espe­cial­ly the Zaidiyyah, explains that camel manure and oth­er ani­mal manure with halal edi­ble meat is halal if the ani­mal eats halal food. If those ani­mals eat the objects con­sid­ered najis, their manure is also acknowl­edged as najis [25]. There­fore, the clas­si­cal views from the Ula­ma on ani­mal manure are broad­ly divid­ed into najis and sacred. Table 1 presents two per­spec­tives on the excre­ment sta­tus of the excre­ment isti­ha­lah from Ulama.

Table 1. The Excre­ment Sta­tus of the Excre­ment Istihalah

No   Mad­habs Law Require­ment
1 Sun­ni Hanafi, Mali­ki, Hambali divine Changes in shape
  Shafi’i divine Nat­u­ral­ly change with no mix­ture with oth­er ingredients
2 Shi’i Zaidiyyah divine The strug­gle of form from being some­thing useful

In Islam, halal prod­uct com­mer­cial­iza­tion car­ries no juris­tic con­se­quences, but the najis object com­mer­cial­iza­tion may move dif­fer­ent­ly. The najis object can be com­mer­cial­ized once it has under­gone rit­u­al purifi­ca­tion and trans­formed into a halal prod­uct. This trans­for­ma­tion process is known as isti­ha­lah or iha­lah [26]). The trans­for­ma­tion cov­ers three aspects: col­or, taste, and smell [27]. Addi­tion­al­ly, in oth­er terms, this process is pop­u­lar as dza­tiy (change of entity).

These issues require an answer that fol­lows the pri­ma­ry sources in Islam, name­ly Al-Qur’an and Sun­nah, along with the opin­ion of Islam­ic law experts author­i­ta­tive in the four mad­dhabs (Hanafi, Mali­ki, Shafi’i, and Ham­bali) fol­lowed by most Mus­lims around the world. The stud­ies on man­ag­ing and uti­liz­ing ani­mal waste in renew­able ener­gy do not aim to legit­imize the prod­uct. It instead seeks to inves­ti­gate the short and long-term prob­a­ble ben­e­fits of this renew­able ener­gy. It is lin­ear with the Islam­ic prin­ci­ple, say­ing that ben­e­fit is the pri­ma­ry pur­pose of Islam­ic law in real­iz­ing good­ness for humankind. Ten things are unclean in the Shia school, name­ly: (1) blood, (2) sperm from liv­ing things that have blood flow­ing in their bod­ies, be they humans, ani­mals, liv­ing on land or in the sea, even though the meat is law­ful to eat, (3) car­cass­es. Ani­mals that have blood flow­ing in their bod­ies, (4) main­land dogs, (5) main­land pigs, (6) infi­dels (non-Mus­lims), both gen­uine and apos­tates, (7) intox­i­cants in orig­i­nal liq­uid form, (8) liquor, (9) urine, (10) ani­mal feces that are not law­ful to eat, such as dog and pig excre­ment or ani­mals that only eat feces/​unclean [28].

The Ula­ma from the four pre­dom­i­nant mad­habs in Sun­ni Islam­ic jurispru­dence, Hanafi, Mali­ki, Shafi’i, and Ham­bali, state that the excre­ment object has changed and no longer car­ries its innate ele­ments can be con­sid­ered as halal and sacred. This defor­ma­tion can be car­ried out through burn­ing, frag­men­ta­tion, mix­ing, and so forth [29]. How­ev­er, the Shafi’iyah and Han­abi­lah ula­ma lim­its this isti­ha­lah process, which can only be car­ried out on alco­hol, the skin of the corpse (except pig and dog), and the lar­va from the car­cass. Mean­while, the Hanafiyyah and Malikiyah give no lim­i­ta­tion for the isti­ha­lah [30].

In the issue of bio­gas and bio­mass, ani­mal manure and human manure (per­ceived by some peo­ple as najis), with car­bo­hy­drates, pro­teins, and lipids as their pri­ma­ry com­po­nents, have expe­ri­enced shape trans­for­ma­tion into gas. In this form, the gas’ most sig­nif­i­cant com­po­nent is methane (CH4, 50–70%) and car­bon diox­ide (CO2, 30–40%), fol­lowed by nitro­gen (N2), ammo­nia (NH3), and hydro­gen sul­fide (H2S). There­fore, bio­gas has under­gone isti­ha­lah, fol­low­ing the Islam­ic jurispru­dence, so that accord­ing to Hanafi, Mali­ki, and one of the Ham­bali mad­hhabs, the pro­duced bio­gas is divine and can be used. The trans­for­ma­tion­al flow of this najis object into the divine bio­gas is pre­sent­ed in Fig­ure 1.

Fig­ure 1. Trans­for­ma­tion­al Flow of Excre­ment Object into Divine Object

The Law on the Sale and Purchase of Animal Manure

The rule on the sale and pur­chase of ani­mal manure as bio­gas can be deter­mined from the law on sell­ing and pur­chas­ing najis objects. The fiqh schol­ar’s view­point on this issue orig­i­nat­ed from under­stand­ing fiqh mad­habs ula­ma in the fol­low­ing hadith. This hadith is from the Prophet’s clos­est com­pan­ion, Jabir bin Abdil­lah, who lis­tened to the Prophet say­ing dur­ing the con­quest of Makkah: “Indeed, Allah and His Prophets for­bid the sale and pur­chase of alco­hol, car­cass, dogs, and idol­a­try.” Then, some­one asked, “The Prophet, what about the fat from the corpse that can be used to pol­ish the boats and skin while also being used by humans as gas for elec­tric­i­ty.” The Prophet answered, “No, sell­ing that object is haram.” Then, He said, “May Allah destroy the Jew­ish, Allah pro­hibits (haram) for them the fat (from a corpse), while they melt­ed it, sell it, and used the mon­ey to eat” (HR. Bukhari) [21].

This hadith explains that the sale and pur­chase of the corpse’s fat are pro­hib­it­ed, while the mon­ey from its sell­ing is also haram, even if it is ben­e­fi­cial for human life. From that behav­ior, the Prophet also prayed for the bad­ness of the Jew­ish because they prac­ticed that activ­i­ty. There are dif­fer­ent mad­habs relat­ed to sell­ing and pur­chas­ing najis objects, includ­ing ani­mal manure and the pro­duced biogas.

In the Shafi’i school and most of the mad­dhabs, they require that the object that can be sold and pur­chased should have val­ue (muta­maww­al). There­fore, if the najis objects have val­ue, they can be sold and pur­chased. Mean­while, in the Hanafi school, an object can be bought and sold not because of its najis sta­tus but because it ben­e­fits humankind [31].

Specif­i­cal­ly, there are three pri­ma­ry opin­ions on the law of sell­ing and buy­ing ani­mal manure (sir­jîn). First, it is allowed by the Hanafi mad­hab, Ibnu Qasim from Mali­ki mad­hab, and one of the opin­ions from the Ham­bali mad­hab. Sec­ond, it is pro­hib­it­ed, accord­ing to Shafi’i mad­hab. Third, accord­ing to the Mali­ki mad­hab, the manure can be sold and bought from the ani­mal with edi­ble and halal meat that has been slaugh­tered, but if the ani­mal is not halal, then the manure is najis.

Even if the Shafi’i mad­hab pro­hibits the sell­ing and buy­ing of manure of ani­mals, this mad­hab allows the trans­fer of own­er­ship of the ani­mal manure through the mech­a­nism of naql yad (trans­fer of own­er­ship). The dif­fer­ence between naql yad and buy­ing and sell­ing is in the func­tion of mon­ey; in buy­ing and sell­ing, the mon­ey is the medi­um of exchange equal to the objec­t’s val­ue, while in the naql yad the mon­ey is the reward giv­en to the pre­vi­ous own­er [32]. Accord­ing to the views of the Shi’a mad­hhab, ani­mal dung that can be use­ful can also be trad­ed. In the Shi’a mad­hhab, the ben­e­fits of ani­mal urine can be used, and ani­mal waste can be used as fer­til­iz­er or fuel. Using manure for fer­til­iz­er and fuel is a cal­cu­lat­ed use in their view [28].

The Process of Biogas Production

Ani­mal manure or waste is an exclu­sive source of ener­gy that can be used to meet cur­rent ener­gy demands. Man­ag­ing this ani­mal waste also resolves the issue of waste man­age­ment in most parts of the world [6]. One of the means to use ani­mal manure is by trans­form­ing it into bio­mass ener­gy in the form of bio­gas. The process of bio­mass-to-bio­gas trans­for­ma­tion is known as methane fer­men­ta­tion or anaer­o­bic diges­tion. Four bio­chem­i­cal process­es dur­ing methane fer­men­ta­tion are hydrol­y­sis, aci­do­ge­n­e­sis, ace­to­ge­n­e­sis, and methano­gen­e­sis [33]–[35] illus­trat­ed in Fig­ure 2.

Fig­ure 2. The reac­tions in the methane fer­men­ta­tion process (Al-Nawawi, 2001).

In hydrol­y­sis, the hydrolyt­ic bac­te­ria secrete the extra­cel­lu­lar enzyme to trans­form car­bo­hy­drates, lipid, and pro­teins into glu­cose, long-chain fat­ty acid (LCFA), and amino acid [36]. The aci­do­genic microor­gan­isms absorb the hydrol­y­sis prod­ucts through their cell mem­brane and digest them through their metab­o­lism, result­ing in the pro­duced VFA, which comes into the ace­to­ge­n­e­sis process, along with the metab­o­lism results in the form of acetic acid ready for the ace­to­lac­tic methano­gen­e­sis [37]. In the methano­gen­e­sis process, the last stage of anaer­o­bic diges­tion, the methanogenic microor­gan­isms con­sume acces­si­ble sub­stances to pro­duce methane and car­bon diox­ide [38]. Fig­ure 3 show­cas­es the trans­for­ma­tion of ani­mal excre­ment into bio­gas and oth­er products.

Fig­ure 3. Trans­for­ma­tion of ani­mal excre­ment into bio­gas and oth­er prod­ucts (Fer­ry, 2010)

Animal Manure Commercialization

The halal sta­tus of bio­gas uti­liza­tion that fol­lows the fiqh law rais­es anoth­er issue. If the bio­gas is pro­duced mas­sive­ly, then the accu­mu­la­tion of the manure from the cat­tle­men can be an issue. Besides, the dis­tri­b­u­tion of the pro­duced bio­gas and the trans­ac­tion process of the prod­uct should also be con­sid­ered. About this issue, Shafi’i mad­hab offers naql al-yad trans­ac­tions. In this opin­ion, they also explain that najis objects are allowed if they are not con­sumed. Mean­while, dis­tri­b­u­tion through a third par­ty is also per­mit­ted, accord­ing to the fiqh rules.

The rule per­ceives that the uti­liza­tion of najis object is in mua­malah (the rela­tions between humans and the envi­ron­ment), in which the ori­gins of the fiqh states that al-ashl fî al-muâ­malât al-ibâhah (the prove­nance law in mua­malah is allowed). Besides, the pri­ma­ry rea­son for bio­gas uti­liza­tion is to ful­fill a human need (hâjah) so that it is per­mit­ted [39]. The wide-scale pro­duc­tion of bio­gas requires a sig­nif­i­cant amount of raw mate­r­i­al sup­ply. Con­se­quent­ly, peo­ple may com­mer­cial­ize ani­mal manure. Islam has reg­u­lat­ed the com­mer­cial­iza­tion of both human and ani­mal manure. From fiqh law’s per­spec­tive, the com­mer­cial­iza­tion of excre­ment objects has been dis­cussed across mad­hab. Islam­ic law regards the uti­liza­tion and com­mer­cial­iza­tion of an object as dif­fer­ent mat­ters. An object can be uti­lized but pro­hib­it­ed from being com­mer­cial­ized, such as a human is haram to be com­mer­cial­ized, but human ser­vice can be used.

Utilization of Biogas

Islam­ic law’s per­spec­tive on najis objects is inter­re­lat­ed with the the­o­rems from Al-Qur’an and al-hadiths. One of the pos­tu­lates on avoid­ing najis objects is the pro­hi­bi­tion to get­ting close and con­sum­ing najis bev­er­age from alco­hol, as explained in the Quran (Quran 5: 90, Keme­nag) “O you who have believed, indeed, intox­i­cants, gam­bling, [sac­ri­fic­ing on] stone alters [to oth­er than Allah], and divin­ing arrows are but defile­ment from the work of Satan, so avoid1 it that you may be suc­cess­ful.” This Al-Qur’an verse describes alco­hol (intox­i­cants) as an excre­ment object that should be avoid­ed and nev­er be uti­lized. It is lin­ear with a hadith. Dur­ing the con­quest of Makah, the Prophet said, “Indeed, Allah and His Prophets for­bid the sale and pur­chase of alco­hol, car­cass­es, dogs, and idol­a­try.” Then, some­one asked, “The Prophet, what about the fat from the corpse that can be used to pol­ish the boats and skin, while also can be used by humans as gas for elec­tric­i­ty.” The Prophet answered, “No, sell­ing that object is haram.” (HR. Bukhari) [21].

As explained in the pre­vi­ous hadith, the fat from the corpse has three uti­liza­tions, name­ly (1) to pol­ish boats, (2) to pol­ish skin, and (3) as the fuel for elec­tric­i­ty. In the last part of the hadith, the Prophet empha­sizes the haram sta­tus of the object. Con­se­quent­ly, three opin­ions relat­ed to the uti­liza­tion of the najis object emerge. First, accord­ing to the Han­abi­lah mad­hab, the employ­ment of najis objects (corpse’s fat) as elec­tric­i­ty’s fuel is pro­hib­it­ed [40]. Sec­ond, from the Malikiyah mad­hab, the uti­liza­tion of najis object that gets peo­ple smudged on it is also pro­hib­it­ed (Al-Ham­bali, 2001). This opin­ion also sup­ports Han­abi­lah mad­dhab, as men­tioned by Ibnu Taimiyah and Ibnu al-Qayy­im al-Jauziyyah [41].

This view was orig­i­nat­ed from a hadith explain­ing that when the Prophet walked toward a dead goat, and He said, “Why did not the own­er make use of it and tan it” (HR. Bukhari Mus­lim) [21], [42]. Mean­while, anoth­er hadith tells us that when a goat is donat­ed to a Maimu­nah’s slave, then the goat is dead. The Prophet met him and said, “Why did not you take the skin, tan, and use it?” then he said, “It was a corpse,” then The Prophet said, “it is only haram to eat it” (HR. Bukhari Mus­lim)) [21], [42]. The hadith sig­ni­fies that uti­liz­ing najis objects, such as the goat corpse, is allowed and sug­gest­ed in some cas­es. There­fore, the uti­liza­tion of the najis object is allowed and halal.

Biomass Applications

Bio­mass has a lot of poten­tial and appli­ca­tion in var­i­ous fields, name­ly auto­mo­tive, cos­met­ic, bio­com­pos­ite, pulp and paper, phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal, med­ical, tex­tile, nanocel­lu­lose, food, and elec­tron­ic [43]. How­ev­er, along with the glob­al ener­gy cri­sis, the appli­ca­tion of bio­mass for gen­er­at­ing ener­gy is increas­ing. Bio­mass is the most effec­tive source of bio-renew­able ener­gy since it exists world­wide. About 15% of the glob­al ener­gy is sup­plied by bio­mass ener­gy sources. It sup­ports up to 35% of ener­gy in the devel­op­ing coun­tries [44].

Nev­er­the­less, in devel­oped coun­tries, gasi­fi­ca­tion-based bio­mass has been used com­mer­cial­ly as bioen­er­gy for dai­ly needs such as cook­ing and ener­gy for heaters on a big scale. How­ev­er, in devel­op­ing coun­tries, bio­mass uti­liza­tion is still lim­it­ed to fer­til­iz­er and bio­gas on a small scale. Bio­mass renew­able ener­gy sources, such as rice husk, trees, wood, and saw­dust, can be uti­lized as ener­gy and non-ener­gy sources. As an ener­gy source, bio­mass is con­vert­ed to fuel or gen­er­ates heat and elec­tric­i­ty. Fuel from bio­mass can be sol­id fuels (bri­quettes), liq­uid fuels (biodiesel pro­duc­tion), and gaseous fuels (syn­thet­ic gas). As a non-ener­gy source, bio­mass plays a part in agri­cul­tur­al and indus­tri­al pur­pos­es. In agri­cul­ture, bio­mass can be ani­mal feed and food, treat­ment of soil and biochar, and recy­cling mate­ri­als. In addi­tion, con­struc­tion, chem­i­cal, and adsor­bent mate­ri­als are bio­mass for indus­tri­al pur­pos­es [44].

Scientific Perspectives on Istihalah

When viewed from the per­spec­tive of nat­ur­al sci­ence (sci­ence), isti­ha­lah (change) is clas­si­fied into two types: chem­i­cal and phys­i­cal. The main dif­fer­ence between the two changes is form­ing a new sub­stance. A change is called a chem­i­cal change if the change pro­duces an unknown sub­stance; for exam­ple, the reac­tion between oxy­gen gas (O2) and hydro­gen gas (H2) has water (H2O). In phys­i­cal changes, no new sub­stances are formed; only changes in mate­r­i­al prop­er­ties occur. For exam­ple, the phys­i­cal form changes, but the com­po­nents of the con­stituent sub­stances are the same; heat­ed ice will melt into water, or vice ver­sa. The phys­i­cal prop­er­ty of ice is com­plex, while water is soft. The sub­stance that makes up ice and water is still the same: the H2O mol­e­cule. Based on most schol­ars’ opin­ions, it is evi­dent that the changes that occur in isti­ha­la are includ­ed in chem­i­cal changes. Here are some exam­ples of isti­ha­lah quot­ed from the book al-Mausu’ah al-Fiqhiyah al-Kutiyah I/​278.

Khamer turns to vinegar

Khamer referred to in this con­text, seems to be an alco­holic bev­er­age. The type of alco­hol found in khamer is usu­al­ly ethanol, which has the chem­i­cal for­mu­la C2H5OH, while vine­gar has the chem­i­cal for­mu­la CH3COOH. Ethanol belongs to the class of alco­hol com­pounds, while vine­gar belongs to the class of car­boxylic acid com­pounds. The two groups of com­pounds have dif­fer­ent chem­i­cal prop­er­ties. Thus, con­vert­ing yeast (in the con­text of alco­holic bev­er­ages) to vine­gar is a chem­i­cal change.

Animal manure is burned to ash

The main com­po­nents of ani­mal and human waste are car­bo­hy­drates, pro­teins, and fats from diges­tion. When burned, an oxi­da­tion reac­tion pro­duces car­bon diox­ide gas (CO2) and water vapor (H2O), leav­ing black ash. Thus, the change from dirt to ash is a chem­i­cal change. A lump of blood (from sperm) that is unclean then turns pure after becom­ing a lump of flesh. Sperm becomes a lump of the flesh and under­goes chem­i­cal changes. Sperm fer­til­izes the egg and then becomes an embryo; with ade­quate nutri­tion, it devel­ops into a lump of meat. The chem­i­cal com­po­si­tion of the sperm and the lump of flesh that is formed is chem­i­cal­ly almost the same, but the chem­i­cal com­po­nents in the meat are not the chem­i­cal com­po­nents of the ini­tial sperm. The chem­i­cal com­po­nents have been regen­er­at­ed increas­ing­ly; for exam­ple, the pro­tein found in sperm and a lump of meat is dif­fer­ent. Based on these sci­en­tif­ic stud­ies, the term that occurs in sev­er­al exam­ples of the hadith quot­ed by the four schools of thought is a chem­i­cal change. Thus, it can be con­clud­ed that changes in the bio­gas pro­duc­tion process from ani­mal manure include isti­ha­lah so that bio­gas is con­sid­ered sacred. The process of chem­i­cal change has been explained in the sub­chap­ter on bio­gas production.

Conclusions

Pro­duc­tion and dis­tri­b­u­tion, as well as the use of bio­gas made from ani­mal manure can be broad­ly con­sid­ered to be per­mis­si­ble or halal. Even if there is an opin­ion that pro­hibits it for spe­cif­ic rea­sons, then, on the oth­er hand, anoth­er Islam­ic law allows it. There are sev­er­al rea­sons an argu­ment for the per­mis­si­bil­i­ty of bio­gas. Ani­mal manure is sacred and has expe­ri­enced a chem­i­cal trans­for­ma­tion process (isti­ha­lah) into methane gas. Thus, it is no longer najis, and its trad­ing is also allowed with the naql yad tech­nique (trans­fer­ring pow­er), even though some peo­ple still con­sid­er it najis. Trad­ing halal bio­mass is also gen­er­al­ly allowed. Even if an opin­ion pro­hibits the sale and pur­chase of bio­mass, it has been answered by the exis­tence of the bio­mass as some­thing sacred, so that or it could be by trans­fer­ring own­er­ship (naql al-yad). Bio­mass can be dis­trib­uted direct­ly or through agents, even for com­mer­cial pur­pos­es. Thus, there are no longer rea­sons for Mus­lims in Indone­sia (with the major­i­ty of the Syafi­iyah mad­hhab), as well as the world’s Mus­lims, to hes­i­tate to use bio­gas made from manure, even the Zaidiyyah school of Shitte Islam also allows its uti­liza­tion, pro­duc­tion, and distribution.

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Corresponding author biography

 

 

© 2022 by the authors. This is an open access arti­cle dis­trib­uted under the Cre­ative Com­mons Attri­bu­tion License, which per­mits unre­strict­ed use, dis­tri­b­u­tion, and repro­duc­tion in any medi­um, pro­vid­ed the orig­i­nal work is prop­er­ly cited.

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