Chapter: Compensation for Bodily Parts and Their Functions

Whoever destroys something of which a person has only one—such as the nose, tongue, or penis—owes the full blood-money for a life. …

The plural of limb is limbs, meaning an independent part of the human body, such as the hand, foot, finger, eye, nose, and the like.

Know that there are two principles here:

First: No blood-money is due for any paralyzed limb; rather, discretionary compensation is due, except in the case of two limbs: the ear and the nose.

Second: Whoever injures a limb and paralyzes it owes the blood-money for that limb, except for the nose and the ear, because the beauty of the nose and ear remains even when they are paralyzed.

His statement, “Whoever destroys something of which a person has only one—such as the nose, tongue, or penis—owes the full blood-money for a life”: “whoever” is a conditional particle, and the conditional clause is answered by the phrase, “owes the full blood-money for a life.” It must be joined with the particle “fa-” because it is a nominal sentence.

His statement, “owes the full blood-money for a life,” means that he owes the blood-money for a life: if the victim is female, it is fifty camels; and if the victim is male, it is one hundred camels.

Issue: If the man whose nose was removed undergoes surgery and has a nose fitted, and the operation succeeds, is the blood-money still due?

The apparent meaning of the scholars’ words is that the blood-money is due. They have mentioned that whoever destroys