farmland; therefore, the wisdom of the Revealed Law allowed muzāraʿah so that both parties might benefit—this one through his land and that one through his labor—and so that cooperation could secure advantage and repel harm.

Shaykh al-Islam Ibn Taymiyyah, may Allah have mercy on him, said: “Muzāraʿah stems from leasing (ijarah), because in both contracts the two parties share profit and liability.”

Imam Ibn al-Qayyim, may Allah show him mercy, remarked: “It is farther removed from injustice and harm than ijarah, for in a lease one of the two parties inevitably comes out a winner, whereas in muzāraʿah, if the crop grows they share it, and if it fails they share the deprivation.”

For a muzāraʿah contract to be valid, the share of the produce allotted to the worker or the landowner must be specified and must be an undivided proportion of the total yield—such as one-third or one-quarter of whatever the land produces. The Prophet ﷺ contracted with the people of Khaybar for one-half of the harvest. Once the share of one party is set, the remainder automatically belongs to the other, because the yield belongs to them both: when one party’s portion is known, the other’s becomes clear.

If the agreement stipulates that one of them will receive a fixed quantity—say ten sāʿs—or the produce of a particular section of the land while the rest goes to the other, the contract is invalid. Likewise, if the landowner requires that he first take back seed equal to what he provided and that they divide only what remains, the muzāraʿah is invalid, for the land might produce no more than that amount, leaving the worker with nothing. This is confirmed by the hadith of Rāfiʿ ibn Khadij, may Allah be pleased with him: “Renting land for gold and silver is unobjectionable; people used to lease land in the time of …”