Whatever has emerged from its blossoms, such as apricots and apples, and whatever has emerged from its sheaths, such as roses and cotton, belongs to the seller. Whatever precedes that, along with the foliage, belongs to the buyer. No fruit may be sold before its ripeness becomes evident.

His statement, “Whatever has emerged from its blossoms, such as apricots and apples, and whatever has emerged from its sheaths, such as roses and cotton”: all of this belongs to the seller if it has emerged, because it resembles the pollinated date palm according to the sounder view, or the date palm whose spathe has split open.

His statement, “Whatever precedes that”: ma is a relative pronoun functioning as the subject.

His statement, “and the foliage”: it is coordinated with ma.

His statement, “belongs to the buyer”: this is the predicate of the subject. That is, whatever precedes this and the foliage belong to the buyer. However, it is appropriate for the predicate to be preceded by fa’ for two reasons:

First: the relative pronoun ma conveys generality and thus resembles a conditional expression. It is well known that when the response to a condition is a nominal sentence, it is joined with fa’. For this reason, fa’ is always joined to its predicate.

Second: it makes the meaning clearer. For if he had said, “Whatever precedes that, and the foliage belongs to the buyer,” one might suppose that “belongs to the buyer” is connected to an omitted word and functions as a circumstantial qualifier of “the foliage”—that is, “and the foliage, while belonging to the buyer”—and would then await the predicate. When fa’ is used, this possibility is eliminated.

In any case, whatever was before the splitting open—according to the position adopted by the author—or before pollination—according to the sounder view, even if the spathe has split open—as well as whatever has appeared from the grapevine and whatever has appeared from its blossoms, that is, its flowers, and the like, belongs to the buyer.