Chapter on Judicial Letters Between Judges, Secondary Testimony, and the Withdrawal of Witnesses

A judge’s letter to another judge may at times be indispensable. When a person’s claim lies outside his own town, he cannot establish it or pursue it except by substantiating it before the judge of that locality, who then writes to the judge competent to carry out the remaining judicial procedures. Transporting the witnesses themselves may be impossible, and they may be known in one place but not in another; thus the right cannot realistically be proved without one judge writing to another.

The entire Muslim community concurs that such correspondence is to be accepted for the establishment and enforcement of rights. Solomon—peace be upon him—wrote to Bilqis, and the Prophet Muhammad, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, wrote to the Negus, to Caesar, and to Chosroes inviting them to Islam; he also corresponded with his governors and tax collectors. All of this attests to the lawfulness of acting upon such letters.

A judge’s letter is admissible in every matter that concerns a human being’s private right, but it is not admissible with respect to the penal limits set by Allah—such as the prescribed punishments for adultery or for drinking wine—because the rights that belong to Allah Most High are founded on concealment and on warding off punishment whenever there is any doubt.