Which colours is a person allowed to dye his hair with

Question

I wanted to know which colours can you dye your hair with? I know you have to avoid black but are all the colors except black allowed or just a few like natural hair Colors?

Answer 1

Praise be to Allah.

Firstly:

It is permissible to dye the hair any colour apart from black, and there is no differentiation in this regard between old men and young men. There is nothing wrong with dyeing the hair before grey hairs appear. It says in Fataawa al-Lajnah al-Daa’imah (5/168):

With regard to the Prophet (peace and blessings of Allaah be upon him) dyeing his hair, there is some difference of opinion as to whether he dyed his hair or not. Ibn al-Qayyim (may Allaah have mercy on him) said: The Sahaabah differed as to whether he dyed his hair. Anas said: He did not dye his hair. Abu Hurayrah said: he did dye his hair. Hammaad ibn Salamah narrated from Humayd that Anas said: I saw the hair of the Messenger of Allaah (peace and blessings of Allaah be upon him) dyed. Hammaad said: And ‘Abd-Allaah ibn Muhammad ibn ‘Aqeel told me: I saw a few hairs of the Messenger of Allaah (peace and blessings of Allaah be upon him) in the possession of Anas ibn Maalik that were dyed.

A group (of scholars) said that the Messenger of Allaah (peace and blessings of Allaah be upon him) used to use a great deal of perfume, and his hair had become red from that, so people though that he had dyed it but he had not. Abu Rithmah said: I came to the Messenger of Allaah (peace and blessings of Allaah be upon him) with a son of mine, and he said: “Is this your son?” I said, “Yes, I bear witness to that.” He said: “He is not responsible for your sins and you are not responsible for his sins.” He said: And I saw grey hair that had been dyed red. Al-Tirmidhi said: This is the best and clearest report that has been narrated concerning this, because the saheeh reports state that the Prophet did not turn grey. Hammaad ibn Salamah narrated from Sammaak ibn Harb that it was said to Jaabir ibn Samurah: “Was there any grey hair on the head of the Prophet?” He said: “There was no grey hair on his head except a few hairs at the parting, and when he put on perfume, its colour covered them.”

From Zaad al-Ma’aad, 1/169

The most that we can say is that it is permissible so long as it does not involve imitating the kuffaar or cause any harm to one's health, in which case it is haraam. And Allaah knows best.