- Legal ruling: The rules that govern a gift are in every respect unlike those that govern a wager, even though the two share nothing more than the bare fact of transferring wealth to another without any consideration in return for the one who parts with it.
That is the sole element they have in common with gifts and voluntary donations, while the differences between this contract and a gift contract are too evident to require explanation.
Once this is understood, the correct conclusion is that this contract constitutes an independent type of agreement with its own regulations that distinguish it from all other contracts; its rulings are therefore not to be inferred from theirs. In Allah the Exalted is all success.
Section
The jurists have differed over this contract: is it binding (lazim) or merely permissible and revocable (jaʾiz)? They hold two opinions.
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The first opinion is that it is among the non-binding contracts. This is the well-known position of the followers of Ahmad, the school of Abu Hanifah, and one of the two views ascribed to al-Shafiʿi ⦗1⦘.
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The second opinion is that it is a binding contract ⦗2⦘. This is the other view reported from al-Shafiʿi and one opinion within the Hanbali school.