Does the meat of a slaughtered animal become haraam if it is slaughtered in front of another animal?
Question a sister wrote on the net following: (in Islam) you cant kill a animal in front of another animal that meat becomes haram. It seems odd, because nowadays also animals which are slaughtered after sharee law, are slaughtered in masses, which would mean in front of each other? Is it true, what that sister…
Question
(in Islam) you cant kill a animal in front of another animal that meat becomes haram.
It seems odd, because nowadays also animals which are slaughtered after sharee law, are slaughtered in masses, which would mean in front of each other?
Is it true, what that sister wrote on net?.
Praise be to Allah.
Firstly:
The fuqaha’ are unanimously agreed that part of the etiquette
of slaughtering is not to slaughter one animal in front of another.
See: al-Mawsoo‘ah al-Fiqhiyyah, 10/221
This is part of the beauty of Islam with its mercy and
kindness and good manners.
Ibn Qudaamah (may Allah have mercy on him) said:
It is makrooh to slaughter one sheep when another is looking
on. End quote.
Al-Mughni (9/317)
And it says in ‘Awn al-Ma‘bood:
He should not handle it violently, or drag it to slaughter
violently, or slaughter it in the presence of another.
Shaykh Ibn Baaz (may Allah have mercy on him) said:
It is makrooh to slaughter (an animal) when another is
looking on. End quote.
Majmoo‘ Fataawa Ibn Baaz
(23/73-74)
Shaykh ‘Abd al-Muhsin al-‘Abbaad said:
He should not slaughter it with a tool or cause pain to it as
he is slaughtering it. Also he should not slaughter it in front of another,
because this is torture. End quote.
Sharh Sunan Abi Dawood, 14/212
Secondly:
If one animal is slaughtered in front of another, this does
not mean that eating its meat is haraam, if the slaughter is done in the
proper Islamic manner, because all he has done thereby is something makrooh,
and such actions do not make the meat haraam.
Thirdly:
With regard to slaughtering animals together in front of one
another, as is the case in mechanised slaughterhouses, there is nothing
wrong with it, because one animal does not see another when it is being
slaughtered; rather they are all slaughtered at the same time with one
movement of the machine.
The scholars of the Standing Committee for Issuing Fatwas
said: It is permissible to slaughter animals using modern machines so long
as the blades are sharp and they cut the throat and the windpipe.
If the machine slaughters a number of chickens at one time,
then it is acceptable to mention the name of Allah once by the one who is
operating the machine when he starts it, with the intention of slaughtering,
so long as the person who is operating the machine is a Muslim or a kitaabi
(i.e., a Christian or a Jew). End quote.
Fataawa al-Lajnah al-Daa’imah,
22/463.
And Allah knows best.
