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Distressed about lottery winnings

Question

assalamu alaikkum warahmathullah,i am 19 yrs old female....and i live with my parents. we are a moderate middle class family and allah subhanathallah has kept us happily.we are a family that depends upon daily income and with what allah gives us.and have a few debts alsoand we don't believe in luck ...recently i received an email that said i had won a lottery that choses winners through email i.d .and said i won 1 million dollars..but the minute we heard of it ,we were very unhappy about it..we are very afraid since we have to give accounts to allah the MOST HIGH on the day of judgement ...but this offer is not leaving us.we are receiving frequent calls and messages that trouble us.even if this is a blessing from the almighty ,this is extremely beyond our imagination..so we consider it as a whispering from shaitan the outcast and we r avoiding it.is our fear right and is their any problem in avoiding it?we r doing this only of fear of allah..pls give uus yur counselling on this matterwe even do istikarajazakalla khairaassalamu alaikum

Answer

All perfect praise be to Allaah, The Lord of the Worlds. I testify that there is none worthy of worship except Allaah, and that Muhammad is His slave and Messenger. We ask Allaah to exalt his mention as well as that of his family and all his companions.

The money you won is unlawful money because lottery is gambling which is forbidden in Islam. Allaah Says (which means): {O you who have believed, indeed, intoxicants, gambling, [sacrificing on] stone alters [to other than Allaah], and divining arrows are but defilement from the work of Satan, so avoid it that you may be successful.}[Quran 5:90].

Therefore, you should not accept this amount, since you have not received it yet, and you should not even think about it.

We warn you that it is possible the e-mail is a fraud or it might be a trick from those who pirate the accounts of people to steal money from their accounts; so, one should be careful in this matter.

Allaah Knows best.

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