Ecological Ṣadaqah and Sustainability: A Comparative Study of Ḥadith Commentaries on Tree Planting in Ikmāl al-Mu’lim and Fatḥ al-Mun’im

Abstract

The contemporary ecological crisis calls for environmental ethics grounded in normative, spiritual, and justice-oriented frameworks of resource governance alongside technocratic ones. The Prophetic ḥadith on tree planting in Ṣaḥīḥ Muslim provides an important basis for connecting productive action, benefit across species, and the religious value of ṣadaqah. This study comparatively examines the interpretation of the ḥadith in al-Qāḍī ‘Iyāḍ’s Ikmāl al-Mu’lim bi-Fawā’id Muslim and Mūsā Shāhīn Lāshīn’s Fatḥ al-Mun’im Sharḥ Ṣaḥīḥ Muslim and formulates its relevance to Islamic environmental ethics and sustainability. Employing a qualitative library research approach, the study combines thematic ḥadith analysis, textual analysis, and comparative interpretation. The analysis proceeds through ḥadith verification, examination of its placement within Kitāb al-Musāqāh, identification of semantic elements and interpretive patterns, and dialogue with Islamic land jurisprudence and environmental ethics literature. The findings indicate that al-Qāḍī ‘Iyāḍ emphasizes the virtue of ghars, land cultivation and management, the relationship between beneficial causation and reward, and related juridical implications, whereas Lāshīn expands the interpretation through the semantic distinction between ghars and zar’, muṭlaq al-intifā’ (unrestricted benefit), the plurality of beneficiaries, and the continuity of benefit. The study further identifies a doctrinal tension within fiqh al-arḍ itself, since iḥyā’ al-mawāt attaches ownership to the productive conversion of land classified as desolate, while ḥimā operates by withholding precisely such land from conversion to conserve its pasture. On this basis the study proposes ecological ṣadaqah (sedekah ekologis) as an analytical category for religiously motivated ecological action that generates benefit across species and generations while remaining accountable to legal legitimacy, equitable access, resource governance, and ecological sustainability