anything on credit—for example, by purchasing merchandise from someone and saying, “The price is a debt owed by me.” Such a person is under legal interdiction with respect to both his liabilities and his property.

As for one placed under interdiction because of insolvency, he is interdicted with respect to his property, not his liabilities. Thus, he may not dispose of specific items of his property. But he may incur a liability by purchasing something at a deferred price that falls due after the interdiction has been lifted; this is permissible, and there is nothing wrong with it.

Fifth: his statement, “supervising the endowments within his jurisdiction, so that their conditions may be carried out.” “Endowments” is the plural of endowment. An endowment is property whose principal is retained while its yield and revenue are devoted to charitable use. For example, a man may say, “I endow this house for the poor.” Its principal is retained and cannot be sold, while its yield is assigned to the poor, who may dispose of it as they wish once they take possession of it.

His statement, “the endowments within his jurisdiction,” means the area over which the judge has authority. Suppose he is a judge in a city: his jurisdiction and the area of his authority is that city. He therefore supervises the endowments of the city to ensure that their conditions are carried out, whether those endowments are private or public. A private endowment would be, for example, if someone said, “This is an endowment for his descendants; its administrator is so-and-so, and after him, the judge.” When the first administrator dies, supervision passes to the judge.

A public endowment would be, for example, if someone said, “This is an endowment for the mosques,” in which case the judge is its administrator. He has the right to examine the administrator’s management in order to determine whether he is complying with the stipulated conditions or not. For not every administrator of an endowment fulfills the trust: he may act dishonestly and direct the endowment to purposes other than those stipulated for it. Therefore, we say that the judge has authority to supervise endowments so that their conditions may be carried out.

Sixth: his statement, “carrying out bequests,” as when someone bequeaths ten