a dead animal out to the open country so that people will not be offended by its stench. Hiring someone for that purpose is permissible, for the work itself is lawful. However, if the agreed wage is the hide of that carcass, the contract is invalid and the laborer is instead entitled to the usual going rate. Should he already have flayed the skin and taken it, he must return it to its owner. This is the position of Mālik—and, I believe, of al-Shāfiʿī as well. Abū Ḥanīfah, however, follows the first narration.
His rationale is that when the contract is worded simply as “carrying,” the obligation is not necessarily to carry wine in particular, and the mere act of carrying wine is not in itself sinful: it could be transported in order to be poured away or turned into vinegar. Hence, if it is carried specifically for drinking, the contract is void; yet even then the act of carrying remains reprehensible.
The view that seems stronger—Allah knows best—is that of Ibn Abī Mūsā, for it is closer to Aḥmad’s intent and more consistent with analogy. The Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) cursed “the wine-presser, the one for whom it is pressed, the carrier, and the one to whom it is carried.” Now the presser and the carrier both render a service for which compensation is normally due; that service is not intrinsically unlawful but becomes so because of the purpose of the one who commissions it. It is like selling grapes or must to someone who will make them into wine: if the grapes or must perish in the buyer’s possession, the seller’s property does not simply vanish; he is awarded its equivalent. Likewise here, the service furnished by the lessor should not be lost without recompense; he is given its substitute, for the prohibition of benefiting applies to the lessee, not to him.
Thus we bar him from taking the wage out of deference to Allah’s right, not out of any claim the lessee or purchaser might have. This differs from a person hired for fornication, sodomy, murder, violent seizure, or theft, for the very act itself is forbidden regardless of the hirer’s intent. That is akin to selling carrion or wine: the seller is not awarded the price, because the item itself is intrinsically unlawful.