Can a non-Muslim inherit from a Muslim?

In more detail

• The ḥadīth

  A Muslim does not inherit from a disbeliever, nor a disbeliever from a Muslim. People of two different religions do not inherit from one another.

  Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī 6764 · Sunan Abī Dāwūd 2911 (ḥasan ṣaḥīḥ, al-Albānī)

• Abū Ṭālib’s estate

  ʿAqīl and Ṭālib inherited from their father Abū Ṭālib; Jaʿfar and ʿAlī inherited nothing, because they were Muslims and the other two were not.

  Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī 1588

• What the scholars say

  Ibn Qudāmah reports that the scholars agree a non-Muslim does not inherit from a Muslim. The majority, including Abū Ḥanīfah, Mālik and al-Shāfiʿī, hold that a Muslim does not inherit from a non-Muslim either; a few early scholars are reported to have allowed it, and Aḥmad said there is no disagreement among people on it.

  Ibn Qudāmah, al-Mughnī (Ḥanbalī, with the other schools), 6:367

• A bequest of up to a third

  A Muslim may leave up to a third to people who do not inherit, and an heir cannot receive a bequest. Ibn Qudāmah: a Muslim’s bequest to a non-Muslim (his example is a dhimmī, a non-Muslim living under Muslim rule) is valid, and he knows of no disagreement; he cites the report that Ṣafiyyah left her Jewish brother a third. Ask your imam how it applies to your family.

  Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī 2742 · Sunan Abī Dāwūd 2870 (ḥasan ṣaḥīḥ) · Ibn Qudāmah, al-Mughnī (Ḥanbalī, with the other schools), 6:217

• Without a will, state law decides

  Without a valid will, your state’s intestacy law divides the estate, and a surviving spouse is given priority whatever their religion. Under the Uniform Probate Code as Maine enacted it, a surviving spouse takes the entire estate when no descendant or parent survives, or when all the deceased’s descendants are also the spouse’s and the spouse has no other descendants; blended families divide it differently.

  Legal Information Institute (Cornell Law School), Wex: intestate succession · Me. Rev. Stat. tit. 18-C, §2-102 (Uniform Probate Code), share of spouse

• A spouse’s elective share

  In separate-property states, the law lets a surviving spouse claim a fixed share of the estate even against the will, traditionally a third; in Maine it is half of the marital-property portion. Talk to an estate attorney before you sign.

  Draft an Islamic will

  Legal Information Institute (Cornell Law School), Wex: elective share · Me. Rev. Stat. tit. 18-C, §2-202 (Uniform Probate Code), elective share