Are Blood and Pus Considered Impurities in the Shafi’i School?

Answered by Shaykh Jamir Meah

Question: Assalamu alaykum

I am hearing to opposing versions of whether or not blood is filthy in Shafii fiqh. Please help me in clearing this confusion. Is blood actually filthy in Shafii fiqh?

Answer: Wa’alaykum assalam. I pray you’re well insha’Allah.

Both blood and pus are considered impure (najas) in our school. However, there is a difference between something being impure and an impurity being excused in certain scenarios, and perhaps this is where your confusion stems from.

Excused Impurity

While blood and pus are impure, their presence on one’s clothes and body, in prayer and outside of prayer, maybe excused. The summary of these rulings are:

– If the blood or pus is from another person, or an animal (except from swine or dog) or a swatted insect, then a small amount is excused.

– If the blood or pus is one’s own, then even a large amount of blood is excused. However, this is with the following conditions:

a) The blood was not caused by the person himself, such as cutting himself on purpose

b) The blood is not mixed with something else, even something pure

c) the blood has not moved from the injured area to a ‘distant’ area of the body or clothes, such as blood from the head landing on the arms or feet (as opposed to a part of the body that is ‘near’ to the injured area, such as the face neck or shoulders in this scenario).

If any these conditions are not fulfilled, only a small amount of one’s own blood is excused.

What does a small or large amount mean? This goes back to custom, ‘urf’, what would customarily be considered a small/large amount by most people in one’s area.

[Bushra al Karim, Hashiyat al Bajuri]

And Allah knows best.

Warmest salams,
[Shaykh] Jamir Meah

Shaykh Jamir Meah grew up in Hampstead, London. In 2007, he traveled to Tarim, Yemen, where he spent nine years studying the Islamic sciences on a one-to-one basis under the foremost scholars of the Ribaat, Tarim, with a main specialization and focus on Shafi’i fiqh. In early 2016, he moved to Amman, Jordan, where he continues advanced studies in a range of Islamic sciences, as well as teaching. Jamir is a qualified homeopath.