or because he is travelling at a distance normally regarded as a journey; another opinion restricts this to the distance that entitles a traveller to shorten the prayer. The secondary witness must name the primary witnesses, yet it is not a condition that he commend their uprightness. Even if he does praise them, his testimony is inadmissible when he merely states, “I bear witness to the testimony of two just witnesses,” without naming them.
Section
If the witnesses retract their testimony before the judge issues his ruling, the judge must withhold judgment. Should they recant after judgment but before a monetary award has been collected, the award is nevertheless collected; if the judgment involves a corporal punishment, however, it is not carried out. A retraction made after the sentence has been executed does not undo the ruling.
If what was carried out was qiṣāṣ (retaliatory killing), execution for apostasy, stoning for adultery, or flogging that led to death, and the witnesses then confess, “We gave false testimony intentionally,” qiṣāṣ is taken from them, or—failing that—an aggravated blood money. The judge likewise becomes liable to qiṣāṣ if he admits, “I ruled deliberately.” If both he and the witnesses retract in that manner, qiṣāṣ is taken from all of them; but if they say, “We were mistaken,” half the blood money falls on him and half on them.
If the muzakkī—the person who vouched for the witnesses’ integrity—retracts, the sound view is that he is liable. If the legal guardian (walī) alone recants, qiṣāṣ or blood money is taken from him, and the same applies if he retracts together with the witnesses. Another opinion treats the guardian and the witnesses as joint debtors.
When two witnesses testify to an irrevocable divorce, foster breastfeeding (raḍāʿ), or liʿān (mutual imprecation) and the judge separates the spouses, then the witnesses recant, the separation remains in force. They must, however, pay an indemnity equivalent to such a divorce; according to one opinion only half is due if the separation occurred before consummation. If they testified to a divorce, the judge separated the couple, they then retracted, and it was later proved that a foster-breastfeeding relationship existed between the spouses, no indemnity is owed.
If witnesses in a financial matter recant, they are liable according to the more correct opinion. Whenever all of them retract, the indemnity is divided among them; if only some retract and the remainder still constitute the legally required quorum, no indemnity is due—another view holds that each pays his proportional share. If the quorum is lost and there were no additional witnesses, the indemnity is divided among those who recanted; if there were supernumerary witnesses, only the share attributable to the minimum quorum is divided—a further view bases the division simply on headcount.
If the testimony was delivered by one man and two women, the man bears one-half of the indemnity and the women share the other half. In a raḍāʿ case where one man and four women testified, the man is liable for one-third and the women for two-thirds. If only the man, or any two of the women, retract, the sound view is that no indemnity is due, because a valid quorum still remains.
If one man and four women testified in a monetary case, one opinion distributes liability as in the raḍāʿ case, whereas the sounder view assigns one half to the man and one half to the women collectively, whether the women retract with him or on their own; if only two women recant, the sound position is that nothing is owed.
Witnesses who merely establish a defendant’s muḥṣan status (previous lawful marriage that makes him liable to stoning) or who supply descriptive details alongside witnesses for a conditional divorce or manumission incur no liability.