The Ruling on Shaving Someone Else's Beard
Answered by Shaykh ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz ibn Bāz
The Question
Does the barber who shaves people's beards for them bear sin and guilt for that? And if barbering is his source of livelihood, what is the ruling on the money he takes? Is it ḥarām?
The Answer
You have heard that shaving the beard is ḥarām, and that the beard is what grows on the two cheeks and the chin, what grows on the bone that is level with the earlobe. This is the boundary of the beard: what is above it goes to the head, and what is below it is from the beard. So the beard is what grows on the two cheeks and the chin. Whoever shaves this for people, or trims it for people, is sinful and carries his share of the burden, and what he takes is suḥt (unlawful wealth), ḥarām and reprehensible, because Allah, Exalted in Majesty, says:
وَلَا تَعَاوَنُوا عَلَى الْإِثْمِ وَالْعُدْوَانِ
“But do not help one another in sin and transgression.” — Sūrah al-Māʾidah (5:2)
Whoever helps in what is forbidden has taken part in what is forbidden. This is why the Prophet ﷺ cursed the one who consumes ribā, the one who pays it, the one who writes it down, and its two witnesses, and he said: “They are all the same.” Why did he curse the scribe? Because he helped in sin. And the two witnesses? Because they helped in sin. And he likewise cursed the one who consumes ribā.
The point is that helping in what Allah has forbidden is forbidden, and if he takes money for it, it becomes forbidden earnings. It becomes suḥt. We ask Allah for safety.
The same applies to selling tobacco, wine, and intoxicants, and to their price. All of it is ḥarām. The Messenger ﷺ cursed wine, the one who drinks it, the one who serves it, the one who presses it, the one for whom it is pressed, the one who carries it, the one to whom it is carried, the one who sells it, the one who buys it, and the one who consumes its price. All of them are cursed. We seek refuge with Allah, and we ask Allah for well-being.
Joined to this is what Allah has forbidden of smoking, of hashish, the well-known intoxicant, and of opium. Everything that intoxicates falls under the prohibition: selling it is ḥarām, its price is ḥarām, and cooperating in it is ḥarām. Likewise, shaving beards is ḥarām, and taking a wage for it is ḥarām. The one who pays it has done something forbidden, and the one who takes it has done something forbidden. And there is no might and no power except with Allah.
Source: binbaz.org.sa.