Eating snake

18-9-2002 | IslamWeb

Question:

Can I eat the snake?

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Answer:

Praise be to Allah, the Lord of the World; and may His blessings and peace be upon our Prophet Muhammad and upon all his Family and Companions.

Eating snakes is unlawful. This is the opinion of Hambali and Shafi'e . Both Madhab (schools of Fiqh) claim that eating snakes is unlawful because of their poisonous nature as they can be harmful to the person who eats them. Also, because the Prophet (Sallallahu Alaihi wa Sallam) ordered us to kill them as reported by Muslim from Ayisha (Radiya Allahu Anha) that the prophet said: "Five are the harmful things which should be killed in the state of Ihram or otherwise: snake, speckled crow, rat, voracious dog, and kite" .
So, if snakes were among the things that are lawful, the Prophet (Sallallahu Alaihi wa Sallam) would not have ordered us to kill them without profiting from them.
However, the Maliki school of Fiqh thinks that eating snakes is lawful provided there is no danger of poison to the eater and also provided it is slaughtered in the Islamic way, i.e. by cutting the throat after mentioning the Name of Allah.
Allah knows best.