Ruling on taking the Mushaf out of the mosque or replacing it with another
Question

                I am the imam of a mosque and in the mosque there are more than 250 copies of the Qur’aan, as in all mosques. As you know, most of them are not read and have stayed on the bookshelf for perhaps 20 years. Of course some of them have been put there by the Department of Awqaaf (Islamic endowments) and some have been put there by people or by the mosque committee. Some worshippers want to take a copy to read and some cannot afford to buy their own copy, and others say: Even if I could afford to buy a copy, how long will these copies stay in the mosques? Is it permissible for me to give some of these copies to them (especially if he takes a large copy and replaces it with a small one)?.
Praise be to Allah.Firstly: 
If a Mushaf 
	has been given as a waqf to a specific mosque, it is not permissible to take 
	it out of the mosque to read it at home or replace it with another one. 
The scholars 
	of the Standing Committee (16/19) were asked: Is it permissible to take the 
	Mushaf out of the Haram to read it at home? 
They 
	replied: 
If Mushafs 
	and books have been given as a waqf for people to benefit from in a specific 
	place, it is not permissible to take them elsewhere, whether a Haram or 
	somewhere else, unless the place where they were put is no longer in 
	operation, in which case they should be moved to somewhere where they may be 
	as beneficial or more so. End quote. 
Standing 
	Committee for Academic Research and Issuing Fatwas.
Shaykh ‘Abd 
	al-‘Azeez ibn ‘Abdullah ibn Baaz, Shaykh ‘Abdullah ibn Ghadyaan, Shaykh 
	‘Abdullah ibn Qa‘ood 
Shaykh Ibn 
	‘Uthaymeen (may Allah have mercy on him) was asked: Is it permissible to 
	take a Mushaf from the mosque then return it? 
He replied: 
It is not 
	permissible to take a Mushaf from the mosque then return it, because the 
	Mushafs that are found in mosques are awqaaf donated for the public benefit, 
	for everyone who enters the mosque to benefit from. If someone takes them, 
	then this implies that he is keeping them for himself and depriving others 
	of it, which is haraam and is not permissible even if he replaces it with 
	another Mushaf. The Mushafs in the mosques should be left as they are, and 
	anyone who wants to read them may do so, in the mosque itself.
End quote 
	from Fataawa ash-Shaykh Ibn ‘Uthaymeen, Noor ‘ala ad-Darb.  
Secondly: 
If there are 
	many Mushafs in the mosque and they are not being made use of, there is 
	nothing wrong with transferring the extras to another mosque that needs 
	Mushafs. 
Shaykh Ibn 
	Baaz (may Allah have mercy on him) said: 
If this 
	small mosque does not need some of the Mushafs that are in it, there is 
	nothing wrong with transferring those that are not needed in this mosque to 
	another mosque that needs them, because the aim is that the worshippers 
	benefit from these Mushafs. But to be on the safe side, it is better to ask 
	the imam for permission to do that, because he knows best what the mosque 
	needs. 
End quote 
	from Majmoo‘ al-Fataawa, 20/15.
For more 
	information please see the answer to question no.
	49886 
To sum up: 
	it is not permissible to take the Mushaf from the mosque or to replace it 
	with another. 
If the 
	Mushafs in the mosque are more than is needed, the extra copies may be 
	transferred to another mosque. 
And Allah knows best.