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Hisba (حسبة) is the Arabic word for "accountability before God." It is the term used historically for the office that ensured public welfare and just dealings in Muslim civilization. We borrowed the name on purpose: a Zakat protocol must answer first to faith, and only then to engineering.
From the Qur'an
"Indeed, charities are only for the poor and for the needy and for those employed for it and for bringing hearts together [for Islam] and for freeing captives [or slaves] and for those in debt and for the cause of God and for the [stranded] traveller — an obligation [imposed] by God."
Surat at-Tawbah · 9:60
From the Sunnah
"Take from their wealth a charity by which you purify them and cause them to increase. And invoke blessings upon them; indeed, your prayer is reassurance for them."
Surat at-Tawbah · 9:103
624 CE / 2 AH
Zakat formalized in Madinah
The Prophet ﷺ establishes a treasury (bayt al-mal) and dispatches collectors to gather Zakat from those whose wealth exceeded the nisab threshold.
~700–1500
Bayt al-mal becomes statecraft
Across the Umayyad, Abbasid, and Ottoman periods, Zakat is administered as a state function — funding the poor, freeing captives, sponsoring scholars, and maintaining roads.
1979
First modern Islamic bank
Dar Al-Maal Al-Islami opens in Geneva, beginning the contemporary movement to align finance with Shariah. Zakat collection remains largely informal.
1991
AAOIFI founded in Bahrain
The Accounting and Auditing Organization for Islamic Financial Institutions begins issuing global Shariah standards — including Standard No. 35 on Zakat.
2025
Palm USD launches
The first non-freezable, Shariah-compliant stablecoin issued from the Gulf. Backed by AED and SAR reserves held in Murabaha, Sukuk, and Wakala instruments.
2026
Hisba
Zakat finally meets the rails it always deserved. A 1,400-year-old religious obligation, enforceable on a public chain, with cryptographic receipts and zero protocol fees.
Shariah-pure end-to-end
PUSD is backed by AED and SAR reserves held in Commodity Murabaha, Sukuk, and Wakala instruments — never interest-bearing assets. The currency itself is halal, not just the protocol layered on top.
Non-freezable by construction
The PUSD smart contract has no freeze, blacklist, or pause function. Once your Zakat is sent, no government or issuer can intercept it before it reaches a refugee in Cox's Bazar or a clinic in Yemen.
Settles in under a second
Solana's sub-second finality means you sign once and the recipient has the funds before you've closed the tab. No 3-day banking holds, no 'pending review,' no weekend cutoffs.
Hisba is intentionally minimal. There is no DAO, no governance token, no AUM to optimize. Three on-chain primitives, one off-chain Shariah board.
Recipient Registry
On-chain PDA listing every verified recipient organization, its asnaf category, and its review history.
Distribution Router
A single instruction that splits a payer's PUSD across N recipients in one Solana transaction. Atomic — all succeed or none.
Receipt PDA
Per-distribution Program-Derived Account storing payer, recipient, amount, hawl year, and the Shariah cert ID at time of payment.
Receipt PDA seed
["receipt", payer.key, recipient_pda.key, hawl_year.to_le_bytes()]
Hisba could have been built on USDC, USDT, or any other stablecoin. We chose Palm USD because no other dollar meets all three requirements simultaneously:
Shariah-compliant reserves. PUSD is backed by AED and SAR held in Murabaha, Sukuk, and Wakala — instruments approved by Islamic scholars. USDC and USDT are backed by US Treasury bills, which earn interest (riba) and are categorically not permissible to underpin Zakat distribution at scale.
Non-freezable contract. Zakat is a religious right of the recipient. A stablecoin that can be frozen by the issuer or a regulator turns Zakat into a conditional gift — which is theologically incoherent. PUSD's contract has no freeze, no blacklist, no pause.
Built in the Gulf, global by design. The largest Muslim populations are in South Asia, Southeast Asia, and Africa — far from the rails that govern USDC. PUSD is operated from the world's most active Islamic finance hub and reaches 40+ countries through PSP integrations.
Hisba is open source. The Anchor program, the recipient registry, the Shariah methodology — all of it auditable, forkable, improvable.