the early generations did not all cultivate their lands themselves—nor did most of them do so. We also know that orchard and field sharecropping were not feasible at all times, since they required a trustworthy worker. Not everyone was willing to enter an orchard-sharecropping arrangement, nor was everyone who took land willing to share its produce. They must therefore have leased out cultivated land bearing trees. The legal stratagem of treating the trees’ usufruct as a gratuitous grant is [feeble], and the early generations among the Companions and Successors did not resort to it. The only remaining conclusion is that they acted as Umar did with the property of Usayd ibn al-Hudayr, and as most Muslims have done from those times down to the present day.

Since no report has been transmitted that the early generations prohibited such leases or instructed people to employ the stratagem of a gratuitous grant—despite the need to conduct such transactions—it is known with certainty that Muslims engaged in them without objection from the Companions or Successors. Their practice of them therefore constituted a consensus.

Perhaps those who disagreed over leasing bare land or over field sharecropping did not disagree over leasing tree-bearing land or over orchard sharecropping, since the benefit derived from the land itself is negligible compared with the benefit of the trees.

If it is argued that Harb al-Kirmānī said: Ahmad was asked about the interpretation of Ibn Umar’s report, “Fixed-return leases are usury.” He replied, “It is when someone takes over a village under such an arrangement while it contains date palms and non-Arab peasants.” He was asked, “What if it contains no date palms and is bare land?” He replied, “There is no objection; he is now merely a tenant.” He was asked, “What if it does contain non-Arab peasants?” He replied, “That is the disapproved fixed-return lease.” Harb said: Ubayd Allah ibn Muādh narrated to us,