Points derived from the ḥadith:

1. Bayʿ al-ʿurbān (earnest-money sale): a man purchases a commodity and hands the seller one dīnār or dirham as part of the price. If the buyer ratifies the contract and takes the item, what he has paid is counted toward the price; otherwise, the amount remains the seller’s.
2. The ḥadith indicates a prohibition of this form of contract, and a prohibition implies its invalidity; nevertheless, the ruling is disputed.
3. Dr. ʿAbd al-Razzāq al-Sanhūrī—may Allah have mercy on him—summarised the evidences for both views in his book “Maṣādir al-Ḥaqq” and answered the proofs of those who consider the ʿurbān sale void. After citing what Ibn Qudāmah—may Allah have mercy on him—wrote, he states:
   First: Those who regard the ʿurbān sale as invalid do so on the basis of the Prophet’s hadith ﷺ forbidding it; because the earnest payment is stipulated for the seller without consideration, which renders the condition void; and because it is akin to an unknown option (khiyār) when the buyer stipulates an open-ended right of rescission, saying, for example, “I may return the commodity whenever I wish, along with a dirham.”
   Second: Imam Aḥmad validates the ʿurbān sale. He relies on the report transmitted from ʿUmar, judges the hadith that forbids the ʿurbān sale to be weak, and draws an analogy with a unanimously accepted case: there is no harm if a buyer dislikes the commodity and returns it together with something extra. Aḥmad said, “This is to the same effect.”
   Third: We hold that the rest of the arguments advanced by those who invalidate the ʿurbān sale can be rebutted. The earnest payment is not stipulated for the seller without recompense; rather, the recompense is his waiting with the merchandise, reserving the item until the buyer decides, and foregoing the opportunity to sell it to someone else for a known period. Nor is the ʿurbān sale comparable to an indeterminate option, for