together, its ultimate form would amount to a jiʿālah (reward contract) put forward by both sides, and there is nothing (1) to bar its permissibility.

Once this is understood, then if they both contribute (2) together the arrangement comes even closer to the contracts of exchange and partnership than when only one of them contributes; for they have shared in the labor, and sharing in the labor necessarily entails sharing in the payment of the jiʿālah. This is unlike the case in which only one of them puts up the stake and (3) the financier alone provides the money while the other supplies the work; in that situation (4) they have not shared in the labor at all, and it is comparable to a case where the stake is supplied by an outsider who does not take part with them.

They went on to say: Moreover, if (5) the reason for prohibiting this contract—in which both contracting parties supply the stake without the presence of a muḥallil (a neutral third party whose participation renders the wager lawful)—is the element of risk between profit and loss, then consistency would require declaring every contract that contains such a risk between gain and liability (6) unlawful. That would necessitate banning all forms of partnership, for in every partnership each partner may either incur a loss or realize a gain.

If you say, “Rather (7) there is a third possibility here: that one comes through unscathed, neither profiting nor losing,” your reply would have two aspects: