“A transfer is valid only in respect of a firmly established debt. The debt being transferred need not itself be firmly established. The two debts must correspond in type, description, due date, and amount; any surplus is immaterial.”

“A transfer is valid only in respect of a firmly established debt”: that is, the debt owed by the person upon whom the transfer is made must be firmly established. We now have two debts: the debt being transferred and the debt owed by the person upon whom the transfer is made. We also have a transferor, a transferee, and the person upon whom the transfer is made. One debt is owed by the transferor, while the other is owed by the person upon whom the transfer is made. The transferor is the one from whom payment is sought, the transferee is the claimant, and the person upon whom the transfer is made is likewise one from whom the transferor is seeking payment.

Thus, the debt owed by the person upon whom the transfer is made must be firmly established; that is, it must be established in a manner that is not subject to annulment or liable to be annulled, such as the price of a sold item, rent after the full term has elapsed, a loan, financial liability for injuries, and the like.

What matters is that it be a firmly established debt, as distinguished from a debt that is not firmly established, such as the debt arising from a manumission contract.

For example, a man enters into a manumission contract with his slave for ten thousand, and the slave thereby incurs a debt, since he has purchased his freedom from his master for ten thousand riyals. The master may not then transfer someone to the debt owed by the contract-slave, because it is not firmly established. Thus, if this master owes ten thousand and wishes to transfer his creditor to the debt arising from the manumission contract, payment may or may not be obtained. The person to whom the transfer is made may therefore either be secure or suffer loss; that is, he does not know whether he will have to bear the loss or receive his due. The slave may be unable to pay the agreed amount, in which case the transferee’s right would be lost. This is why the debt owed by the person upon whom the transfer is made must be firmly established.

Likewise, a woman’s dowry before consummation is not firmly established against the husband, because it becomes firmly established only through consummation. If the woman transfers her creditor to the husband for that dowry, the transfer is invalid, because it is not firmly established. So long as he has not consummated the marriage, he may find a defect in her, annul the marriage, and recover the dowry in full; and it is also possible that—