Charity, the poor, and distribution of alms in Ottoman Algiers

The importance of extending alms to the poor in society as well as the merit promised to the charitable believer in the world beyond is repeated in the Quran as one of the important injunctions of the Prophet on all believers. ¹ Of the various modes of extending charity in Islam-zakat, sadaqa, waqf-only the waqf became a fully developed legal institution. Zakat, which took the form of a tax incumbent on all believers and was collected by the political authorities, quickly fell into desuetude. Originally, voluntary charity of all sorts came under the general heading of sadaqa. With the elaboration of the law in the eighth and ninth century, a differentiation was introduced between various forms of charity, for example, a simple gift inter vivos (hiba); a gift post mortem, that is, from that part of an inheritance that could be freely disposed of; and endowments-waqf or habs.² Sadaqa remained a generic term for a charitable gift and in fact for voluntary charity of all sorts. It often appears in connection with endowments. However, it also refers to occasional, unregulated charity of all kinds.