Fatwa On Financial Needs in Non-Muslim Majority Countries: A Case On Mortgages and Insurance

In recent years, there has been an increase in the Muslim population in some non-Muslim countries. These Muslims face challenges in their daily lives to be observant Muslims. To navigate these challenges, they turn to religious authorities for answers to these difficult situations and seek guidance through their rulings or fatawa. The objective of this paper is to explore fatawa that were issued in non-Muslim majority countries in response to challenges faced by Muslims in those countries. These fatawa sometimes make something permissible, which is ordinarily impermissible in a Muslim-majority country. The focus will be on ‘mortgage’ and ‘insurance’ related fatawa. The rulings were analysed to determine the conditions under which the scholars have relaxed the requirements and the arguments used. It was discovered that the main reason cited for this relaxation is an extreme necessity (darurah), although some scholars object to using this reasoning.