filed complaints in the courts because they went bankrupt: they bought land, real estate, and other things expecting their value to rise, but it fell.

A person should therefore not incur debt except in the most extreme necessity—neither through a loan nor through what they call deferred debt. Especially nowadays, when a person dies, his heirs do not hasten to settle his debt; they are unconcerned about it, consume the deceased’s wealth, or delay repayment. This is among the things that should prompt a sensible person to avoid debt altogether.

His statement, “If the bridal gift, or part of it, is deferred, it is valid”: Is consummation permissible? Yes, consummation is permissible, because the bridal gift was established as deferred with the consent of both parties.

“If they specify a term, it is due at that term; otherwise, it falls due upon separation, …”

His statement, “If they specify a term,” means the husband and wife, since a term is not established unless both of them specify it. The apodosis of the conditional clause is omitted; in al-Rawḍ (1), it is supplied as: “It is made contingent upon it,” meaning that it is determined by it.

His statement, “Otherwise,” means: if they do not specify a term. Observe the breadth of the Arabic language: the verb of the conditional clause, its object, and the subject dependent upon that verb have all been omitted.

His statement, “its due time,” with the letter ḥāʾ pronounced with kasrah, differs from “place,” with the ḥāʾ pronounced with fatḥah. “Place” means location, and its verb is ḥalla yaḥullu; whereas “due time,” with kasrah, means the time when something falls due, and its verb is ḥalla yaḥillu.