Berlin -

Germany has about 4.5 million Muslims who form a community with its own customs and traditions within German society.

Among the difficulties of integration, these Muslims face the problem of inheritance distribution according to German law, which differs from the division stipulated in Islamic law.

With the influx of hundreds of thousands of Muslim immigrants to Germany since 2016, some social problems have surfaced, foremost of which are issues of burying the dead and distributing their legacies according to the teachings of Islamic law, which prompted those in charge of the Muslim community to warn of the need to write a will and register it legally.

How is inheritance divided according to German law?

German inheritance law divides heirs into 3 degrees:

First degree:

children and wife.

This category takes everything equally. If a son or daughter dies - during the life of his parents - and has children, then the grandchildren block the grandfather or grandmother, as this category (children) blocks the rest of the categories from the inheritance.

The second degree:

the parents, brothers and sisters in the absence of the first degree, and this degree takes everything equally.

And if there was a brother / sister among them who died before that and had children, then his children take his share of the inheritance.

Third degree:

grandparents and uncles, they take their share equally in the absence of the second degree.

As for the will, it obscures everything except the compulsory share stipulated by the law, and this requires a legal appeal and a court.

In the absence of any of the aforementioned degrees, the province (state) in which the deceased resided at the end of his life inherits from him.

But if the citizen dies in another country, the German federal government inherits him.

What are the means to achieve for Muslims in Germany the distribution of their legacies according to Islamic law?

Muslim problems with the inheritance system in Germany

Khaled Hanafi - Assistant Secretary-General of the European Council for Fatwa and Research and head of the Fatwa Committee in Germany - says that leaving a will for a Muslim in Germany solves a set of problems facing Muslims in general in the country, including allowing him to be shrouded, buried and his inheritance distributed according to Islamic law.

To achieve this, the will must be legally registered.

Hanafi: We recommend that Muslims in Germany write the will and register it with a notary (Al-Jazeera)

The German state permits cremation of the dead body, as many Germans resort to this option because of the high cost of land and the costs of burial that fall on the relatives of the deceased.

Here, Hanafi says - to Al-Jazeera Net - "We recommend to Muslims the necessity of having a written will for each of them. In the event of the death of a German Muslim, he is buried and his legacy distributed according to German law that does not conform to Islamic law. A person can recommend the distribution of the legacy as he wants."

For his part, Fathi Saad - the imam and preacher of the Al-Salam Mosque in the city of Pforzheim - points out that any person in Germany can write his will with all its clauses, and include in it the clauses "burial and inheritance", provided that these clauses are registered with the notary in the presence of witnesses, until the matter is prepared. legally acceptable.

Saad told Al-Jazeera Net, "This is what we recommend to many Muslims. Some of them marry a German woman and are isolated and go to the mosque a little, and some of them may be afflicted with diseases and be far from their original environment, and his wife is not Muslim, so she buries him in illegal ways, such as burning, for example, or all his money goes to her." After his death, but when a German Muslim writes a legal will, it solves the problem of distributing the estate, as it will be distributed according to what he bequeathed, because German law respects the will.”

"The first will" in the organization of inheritance

The chief imam in Germany, Sheikh Ahmed Halil, told Al-Jazeera Net that the inheritance system in German law differs from Islamic law.

According to German law, Article 25 of the Immigration and Nationality Act, the legal inheritance after death was subject to the law of the state to which the testator belonged at the time of his death, and German inheritance law applies to him even if he lived in another country.

Hillel: The German inheritance system differs from Islamic law, but the law respects the will of the deceased (Al-Jazeera)

However, the matter changed with the inheritance regulations in the European Union, according to Sheikh Halil, pointing out that "since August 17, 2015, the legal inheritance has been completely subject to the law of the country in which the testator was a habitual resident at the time of his death (Article 21 of the European Union inheritance regulations) ".

And the chief imam in Germany adds, "Because German law is equal between males and females, and between husband and wife, many Muslims who hold German citizenship have resorted to the law of wills. German law gives every person the right to dispose of his money during his life or to write a will in the event of his death. The guardian over all other laws regulating inheritance.

The will preserves the Islamic identity

For his part, Ali al-Shafi'i - the imam and preacher of the Al-Nour Mosque in Karlsruhe - stresses the importance of the will for a Muslim in Germany, as it preserves his Islamic identity.

He tells Al-Jazeera Net that "there are matters after death that the European Muslim must have a will, such as the funeral, washing the dead, shrouding him and burying him in Muslim cemeteries, as well as inheritance. A European Muslim may be married to a woman of other than his religion, or a non-Muslim may convert to Islam and not declare his conversion to Islam, and after A non-Muslim wife or a non-Muslim family will bury him in the non-Islamic way or cremate him.”

Al-Shafi'i: The will of a Muslim in Germany is a preservation of Islamic identity (Al-Jazeera)

The division of inheritance is also according to German law, so the wife takes over most of the estate, and takes more than the share of the son and daughter, and the mother of the deceased may be deprived of the inheritance.

Another example that illustrates the importance of a will is if a European Muslim dies and has an estate and does not have a family living with him in Germany, or perhaps his family lives in an Arab country, then all his money will go to the city and municipality in which he lived.

In the event that the will is written and legally documented by the notary, the money is divided according to the inheritance system in Islam.