Answered by
Sheikh Sâlim al-Qarnî
It is disliked in Islam to unnecessarily cut down a lotus tree that benefits people by providing shade, leaves, and fruit.
Allah’s Messenger (peace be upon him) said: “Whoever cuts down a lotus tree, Allah will cast him headlong into the Fire.” [Sunan Abî Dâwûd (5239) and Sunan al-Nasâ’î al-Kubrâ (8611) and authenticated by al-Albânî]
If the lotus tree is growing in a place that people need for other purposes like for agriculture or to build a house or to lay a road, then it is permissible to cut it down. Likewise, it is permitted to cut down a lotus tree if its wood is needed – both its trunk and its stems – to build something like a door, a beehive, or a roof. The same can be said if the people of the household are injured by its thorns or similarly inconvenienced.
Abû Dâwûd states after relating this hadîth in his Sunan: “This hadîth is abridged. Its full meaning is that whoever cuts down a lotus tree in open country where a traveler or an animal might seek its shade, and does so for no good reason, oppressively and unjustly, then Allah will cast him headlong into the Fire.”
Source: Islam Today
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