What is the zakat due on 200 head of sheep, and is it permissible to pay the monetary value of zakat, or distribute its value to more than one beneficiary, and what is the age considered for sheep in zakat?

Zakat is obligatory on sheep designated for milk and offspring if they are pasturing (grazing for most of the year); for every two hundred sheep, two ewes are due. As for sheep designated for trade, zakat is obligatory on their value when a full Hijri year has passed.

It is permissible, according to some scholars, to pay the value in cash if it is more beneficial for the poor, but the more cautious approach is to pay zakat from the same type of asset (i.e., sheep), and it is not required to give each poor person a ewe.

It is not permissible to give males if the nisab (minimum taxable amount) includes females. The zakat must be from the average (in quality) of the female pasturing sheep.

As for the acceptable age for zakat, it is a jadha'a from sheep (one that is one year old and has entered its second year, or six months old and has entered its seventh according to the Hanbalis), and a thani from goats (one that is two years old and has entered its third, or one year old and has entered its second according to the Hanbalis).