Title: Eligibility to Receive Inheritance Question: Although I am not a Muslim, I am helping clients with estate planning in a community in which there are a number of Muslims. In order to best serve their needs, I would like to gain an understanding of Islamic principles related to inheritance. One specific question: Is there a rule regarding eligibility to receive a share in inheritance? Answer: According to the Islamic law, only specified relationships have been assigned a share in the inheritance of a person. Thus, for a person to be eligible to get a specified share in the inheritance of a person, he/she should have such a relationship with the deceased, which is given a share by the Qur'an. The relationships, which have been specified absolute or relative shares by the Qur'an, are: Children; (in the absence of children, brothers and sisters) Parents; Spouse [1] ; Besides these relationships, the deceased may, through his/her will make any other person - whether related or unrelated - an inheritor in his/her wealth. Keeping the above explanation in perspective, it may be summarized that a person is eligible to receive a specified share in the inheritance of a person, if: He/she has such a relationship with the deceased, which has been specified a share by the Qur'an; or He/she has been nominated for a specific share by the deceased through his/her will. It should, however, be noted that according to the Islamic law, a person, who is otherwise eligible to get a share in the inheritance of another person, becomes ineligible to get that share, if he/she is guilty of killing such other person. 22 nd June 2000 [1] In case the shares of each of these relationships and the general method of the distribution is required to be known, you may let me know. Nevertheless, it is important to note that my opinion regaridng the individual shares and the general method of distribution is different from that of the majority of Muslim scholars.