and drink, he will die. Some scholars have said: “The same applies if he confines him in the sun during the days of summer until he dies, or confines him on cold winter nights until he dies.” This is correct. Although they did not explicitly mention this case, we subsume it under the governing criterion.

Al-Rawd (1) states: “On condition that it is impossible for him to call for help; otherwise, his death is without liability.” That is, it must be impossible for the confined person to call for help. If calling for help is not impossible for him—such that, were he to ask for food or drink, he would obtain it—then it is not deliberate killing, and his death entails no liability. This is as we said regarding one who throws him into a fire or into water in which he would drown, while he is able to escape.

“Or he kills him by sorcery, or poison; or witnesses testify against him to that which entails his execution, then retract and say: ‘We intentionally sought his death’; and the like. شبه العمد (quasi-deliberate killing) is when one intends an assault that does not ordinarily kill, without wounding him by it, such as striking him in a nonfatal place with a whip or a small stick, …”

The seventh case is his statement: “Or he kills him by sorcery.” Sorcery consists of incantations, knots, spells, and medicines through which harm is brought upon the bewitched person in his body or mind.

Thus, if a man works sorcery against someone until it affects him and he dies, this constitutes deliberate killing, because sorcery ordinarily kills in such a case. However, we have previously stated that the sorcerer must be executed as a prescribed punishment. This sorcerer is therefore liable to execution for two reasons: first, his execution as a right due to Allah—if we do not hold him to be a disbeliever; second, his execution as a right due to the heirs of the slain person. Here, then, two rights conflict: the right of the slain person’s heirs and the right of Allah. Which of them takes precedence?

The answer is that the right of the slain person’s heirs takes precedence. Thus, if the heirs of the slain person say, “Since the man will be executed, we want blood money,” they are entitled to that,