Article 148
The budget of the State has permanent chapters determined by Shari’ah rules. As for the sections of the budget, the amounts allocated for each section, and the issues of each sectioncovered by these amounts are left to the opinion of the Khalifah and his Ijtihad.
The word budget is a Western term, and its meaning is the explanation of the income that the State takes, and an explanation of its chapters, which are the aspects that are gathered in the budget, and an explanation of its sections, which are the branches of these aspects, and an explanation of the amounts which are incoming. Alongside that, there is a draft of the explanation of the expenditure that the State will spend, by explaining its chapters which are the aspects upon which the expenditure will be used, and an explanation of its sections, in other words, the branches of these aspects, and an explanation of the amounts that will be spent upon every one of the issues mentioned in each section. This is the reality of the budget. This reality was not known to the Muslims; rather they knew the Bayt Al-Mal, and the income was sent there and the expenditure was spent from it. However, the presence of income for the Bayt Al-Mal and the fact that the expenditure comes from it, embodies the reality of the budget even if it was not named with that term, and there is nothing to prevent the use of this term according to its terminological meaning, which is the collection of the chapters of income and expenditure, with sections for each of these. Built upon this, the State has a budget, and the Bayt Al-Mal is responsible for this budget.
As for the preparation of this budget in terms of its chapters, sections and amounts which are drafted, these have been decided by the Shari’ah laws. So the Shari’ah laws introduced and decided income such as land taxes and booty, and expenditures were introduced and decided how it should be spent, and it was confirmed what must be spent upon and what needs to be spent upon if the money is found to do so. The income and expenditure were introduced and decided by the Shari’ah rules, and therefore the chapters of the budget are permanently based upon that, since the Shari’ah decided them and the Shari’ah rule is permanent and does not change.