WHO IS THE THAABIH (SLAUGHTERER)
Of vital importance in understanding the Shar’i ruling on this question is to establish who actually is doing the slaughtering (thabah). Is the machine doing the slaughtering or the operator of the machine? There is no difficulty in establishing who or what is doing the actual slaughtering of the animal. The operator of the machine merely presses a button and the machine comes into action. The assistant/s merely usher the animal or bird into the slaughtering machine. Human action then ceases and the animal is automatically slaughtered by the power-operated machine. The only relationship which the human operator has with the process is to switch on the machine. The only relationship which the handler of the animal has is to steer the animal into the machine. Beyond this, they have no participation in the actual act of thabah. The act of thabah is effected
SOLELY by the machine operating automatically, i.e. the actual cutting of the neck-vessels is done by only the machine. No reasonable person can deny this indisputable fact that the animals are slaughtered by the machine and not by any human being. Hence, in regard to the actual slaughtering it is conclusively proven that this is effected by the machine. We have now established that the slaughterer (the thaabih) in this case is the automatic machine and not the operator of the machine or the one who drives or ushers the bird/animal into the machine.
About the thaabih (actual slaughterer), the Shariat decrees:
“And, among its (Shar’i thabah’s) conditions is that the thabih be a person of the’ millat of tauhid…….” (Hidayah)
“Among its conditions is that the thaabih is a Muslim or a Kitabi.”
(Raddul Muhtaar)
There is absolutely no difference of opinion on this issue.
(Extract: Machine Slaughtering & The Sharia)
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