Islamic Fiqh > Inheritance and wasiya > Debts and funeral expenses
The order of charges after death: funeral expenses, debts, wasiya, then heirs; and redeeming missed fasts.
Contents
Updated on 06 October 2026 at 10:50 PM
Before any distribution, the estate bears the commitments of the deceased. The jurists specify the rank of the rights: the right of the legatee and the payment of debts come before the right of the heirs; Hanbalis deduce from the text of the gift that the legatee's right is attached to the shares of the estate and that the heirs' right is postponed after the wasiya and the payment of the debt.
Agreement of the scholars: the wasiya becomes obligatory for unknown debts, owed to people or to Allah, and for entrusted deposits or obligations weighing upon the deceased. The prescribed way to settle these rights is the bequest:
"It is not right for a Muslim who has something to bequeath to spend 2 nights without his written bequest under his hand."
al-Bukhari 2738 ; Muslim 1627
Ibn Umar said: since he heard this word, no night passed without his bequest by him; the hadith is carried by the one who has a debt or a deposit (Ibn Qudama).
If the heirs refuse to hand over the bequeathed third or deny the gift: Hanbalis, in the position of the madhhab, oblige to extract the whole third from what they hold, for the legatee's right is bound to the shares of the estate and the heirs' right is postponed after the wasiya and the payment of the debt; this extraction holds as long as the legatee does not fear the heirs' withdrawal.
Practical order of settlement: prepare the deceased with dignity, pay his debts, execute his bequest within the third, then distribute the rest to the heirs according to the shares fixed by the Book.
Dignified funeral expenses, then debts, then bequests (within the third), then heirs' shares.
Yes: unpaid zakat, kaffaras and makeable fasts settle before bequests per scholars.
Yes: whoever settles the deceased's debts reimburses himself in priority from the patrimony before division.