The Ruling on Employing a Disbeliever for Cooking and Cleaning

Question :

We have a servant-girl who is not a Muslim, is it permissible for me to let her wash the clothes which I wear to pray, and can I eat what she cooks? And is it permissible for me to find fault with her religion and to expose its falseness?

Answer:

It is permissible to employ a disbeliever and to put him to work cooking and cleaning and the like, to eat the food which he prepares and to wear the clothes he sews or washes, because his body is ostensibly clean, and his uncleanness is spiritual. The Companions used to employ slaves among the disbelievers and they would eat whatever food was imported from the lands of the disbelievers, because they understood that their bodies were not physically unclean. But a Hadith has been reported which orders us to wash their dishes before cooking in them, if they use them to drink alcoholic beverages and to cook dead carcasses and pork and to wash the clothes which they have worn next to their private parts. As for finding fault with their religion, and exposing its falseness, that is permissible. That is, the religion which they are currently following, which will be an innovation, such as the worship of idols, or one which has been changed or abrogated, such as Christianity, and the defects will be found in the religion which has been altered, but you must call them to Islam, and explain to them its teachings and its virtues and what it consists of, at the same time as explaining the differences between it and other religions.

Source:
Ibn Jibreen
Fatawa Islamiyah, Vol. 2 Pages 35-36