Writing name of Allah on pillow case
Fatwa No: 344986

Question

Assalaamu alaykum. Is it okay to create a pillow case that has Allaah's name on it. Is there a difference if it is written in English or Arabic? Thank you.

Answer

All perfect praise be to Allah, The Lord of the worlds. I testify that there is none worthy of worship except Allah and that Muhammad, sallallahu ‘alayhi wa sallam, is His slave and Messenger. 

It is incumbent on the Muslim to respect, honor, and glorify the Name of Allah and all the sacred names that must be respected and honored as per the Sharia. Ibn Hajar Al-Haytami wrote, “The Quran and all the sacred names, such as the Name of Allah and the names of the Prophets, must be honored and revered.” [Al-Fataawa Al-Fiqhiyyah]

Writing the Name of Allah on pillow cases constitutes a kind of disrespect because they may be trodden on with feet, be under the heads of sleepers, be reclined against, or the like. The Standing Committee for Scholarly Research and Issuing Fatwas was once asked, “Is it permissible to enter the restroom wearing a garment on which the Name of Allah is written?” The answer was, “It is not permissible to write the Name of Allah on the garment, and it is disliked to enter the restroom wearing it as this constitutes disrespect for the Name of Allah, The Exalted.

The religious ruling is the same whether the Name of Allah is written in Arabic or any other language. Minah Al-Jaleel reads, “(Istijmaar; i.e. cleaning oneself with stones or another material in its place such as wood, tissue, toilet paper, or the like after answering the call of nature cannot be performed with the following items) ... an edible substance or a material on which texts are written or engraved, even if it is not in the Arabic language ... This is the adopted view (of the Maaliki school) even if the content of these texts is false ... Another scholarly view holds that there is no sanctity to texts if written in a language other than Arabic unless they contained sacred names such as the Name of Allah.

Allah knows best.

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