Is it a sin to kill an ant?

Killing a human is murder. Killing an insect is trivial. Stop focusing on trivialities. It is sin to support abortion. It is not sin to squash a mosquito. Under the Old Testament Law, if a fly touched an oven, the oven had to be destroyed. Ovens took time and effort to build. I am confident that truly orthodox Jews were very careful to make sure no flies were in their kitchens, and they had to do so in a way that did not involve actually touching the fly, so they certainly used fly-swatters to keep from touching the flies they killed. We, as Christians, have a much shorter list of Laws that are less about what we do and more about what we have in our hearts. Did God create bugs? Absolutely. Does He consider them as precious resources to be preserved at all costs? Reviewing the many verses about "creeping things" and "things with more than four feet", I find that concept difficult to support. My advice is to swat those flies, use mouse traps as needed, and minimize pest attractants such as uncovered food, crumbs on the floor, and general uncleanliness as much as possible so your home is not a magnet for pests. No verse exists that says "cleanliness is next to godliness", but, if you are at all squeamish about killing pests, at least act proactively to give them no reasons to invade your home.

Question

Is it permissible to kill ants in one's home? I've read a Hadith in which the Prophet (peace be upon him) forbade the killing of ants, but I'm not sure how far this applies.

Answer

Praise be to Allah, the Lord of the World; and may His blessings and peace be upon our Prophet Muhammad and upon all his Family and Companions.

It is Haram to kill ants for the Hadith recorded by

Ahmad , Abu Dawood from Ibn Abbas (Radiya Allahu Anhu) who said: "Allah's Messenger (Sallallahu Alaihi wa Sallam) prohibited the killing of four animals: The ant, bee, shrike and hoopoe" .
But, it is permitted to kill the harmful ants (known as termites) that may harm a human being or his belongings.
Some scholars believe that prohibition of killing the ants is limited only to the Red big ants that are harmless - Insha Allah.
However, we think that the first opinion, i.e. prohibition of killing, is the sound opinion, and it is wrong to break the rule unless it is proved that the ants are harmful and we cannot get rid of them except by killing.
Allah knows best.

Question

Answer

There is no biblical prohibition against killing insects, bugs, spiders, or other such creatures. The Old Testament Law even went so far as to separate out the clean insects that the Israelites could eat from the unclean insects that they couldn’t—eating bugs is one way to get rid of them! “All flying insects that walk on all fours are to be regarded as unclean by you. There are, however, some flying insects that walk on all fours that you may eat: those that have jointed legs for hopping on the ground. Of these you may eat any kind of locust, katydid, cricket or grasshopper. But all other flying insects that have four legs you are to regard as unclean” (Leviticus 11:20–23).

Of course, most of us today are not looking to the world of insects as a food source. When we kill spiders or insects, it is often because they are pests in our homes. There is absolutely nothing wrong with keeping a clean and safe home by ridding one’s house of ants, silverfish, centipedes, scorpions, brown recluse spiders, cockroaches, bedbugs, moths, fruit flies, house flies, horse flies, mosquitoes, etc., etc., etc.

Some people choose to rid their homes of pests “humanely”; that is, they would gently catch the black widow spider crawling across their pillow, keep it alive, and deposit it a safe distance from their house. That is fine. Others would rather swat the spider, stomp on it a few times to make sure it’s dead, and then burn the pillow. That’s fine, too. It’s a matter of conscience. The biblical prohibition “thou shalt not kill” (Exodus 20:13, KJV) refers to premeditated murder of a human being, not squashing the spider on your pillow.

We should make a distinction, however, between ridding one’s home of pests and simply killing spiders and insects for no good reason. God has a purpose for “every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth” (Genesis 1:26, KJV). The spiders and insects are God’s creation, and He owns them: “I know every bird in the mountains, and the insects in the fields are mine” (Psalm 50:11). To treat any of God’s creatures, no matter how small, with wanton cruelty is sin. Focusing a magnifying glass on an ant hill just to see the ants suffer, sprinkling salt on a garden slug just to see it writhe, purposely stepping on any type of bug on the sidewalk just for the morbid satisfaction of it—these are not the actions of a God-fearing person.

Everyone at some point or another unintentionally kills spiders and insects and other less visible creatures simply by walking down the street. This cannot be helped and is not a sin. It’s also not a sin to keep oneself and one’s family safe and healthy—go ahead and swat the fly, kill the tick, and smash the venomous spider. It’s not sinful to protect one’s property, either—go ahead and exterminate the termites and spray for those weevils. A case can also be made for killing spiders and insects in the interest of learning—go ahead and help your child pin the bugs on the board for her science class. But, out of respect for the Creator of all things, we should not participate in the unnecessary, gratuitous killing of spiders and insects in the wild.

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