AUDIO CASSETTES ARE NOT LIKE PAPER
Question:
Is it permissible to throw audio cassettes into the garbage which contain recordings of the Qur’aan or of sayings of the Prophet sallAllaahu `alayhi wa sallam?
Answer:
These cassettes which include some Prophetic Hadiths or verses of the Qur’aan do not actually have the same status of verses of the Qur’aan or Hadiths. They are merely reels of tape that result in a voice being heard when played in a tape machine. So they do not fall under the ruling of papers upon which something is written from the Qur’aan or Hadiths.
Therefore, as long as one does not have the intention of debasing the Qur’aan, there is no harm in discarding them as one pleases; the same goes for entering the washroom with such tapes, there is no harm in that, since neither verses of the Qur’aan, nor Hadiths appear on such cassettes.
Shaykh Muhammad bin Saalih al-`Uthaymeen
Fatawa Islamiyah, vol.7, p.50, DARUSSALAM