The first: repentance removes only the prescribed punishment for brigandage; he remains answerable for all other rights of Allah and rights of people.
The second: repentance removes the prescribed punishment for brigandage and all penalties pertaining to the rights of Allah, such as the punishment for unlawful sexual intercourse, amputation for theft, the punishment for drinking wine, and the like. He remains liable for the property claims of others as debts he owes. If he has killed someone, the victim’s heirs have the choice of having him executed or pardoning him.
The third: repentance removes the penalty for brigandage, all penalties pertaining to the rights of Allah, and liability for the property he has taken, unless any of that property is found intact, not having been destroyed by him. If he has killed someone, however, the victim’s heirs may demand his execution in retaliation if they wish. This is al-Walīd ibn Muslim’s report from Mālik.
The fourth: repentance removes all liability for his acts, whether involving a right of Allah or another person’s right concerning life or property, except where the very property taken is found intact in his possession.
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Scholars differed concerning a brigand who resists capture and whom the ruler grants safe-conduct on condition that he surrender. One view is that the safe-conduct is valid and removes the prescribed punishment for brigandage. Another is that it is invalid and that the prescribed punishment for brigandage must be carried out upon him. This is because a polytheist is granted safe-conduct on condition that he pay the jizya and enter into a covenant of protection, whereas granting safe-conduct to a brigand entails suspending the enforcement of the prescribed punishments against such offenders, which is not valid. This is the position of Ibn al-Mājishūn.
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Concerning those who take up arms on the basis of an interpretation, such as the followers of deviant doctrines
All the foregoing concerns a brigand who takes up arms out of wickedness and lawless rebellion, without any interpretive justification. As for someone who takes up arms on the basis of an interpretation, killing people and seizing property—such as the Harūriyya, the Ibādiyya, the Qadariyya, and all the followers of deviant doctrines—and is then captured without having repented, the prescribed punishment for brigandage is not carried out upon him. Nor is he required to repay the property he took, even if he is wealthy, unless the very property taken is found in his possession, in which case it is returned to its owner.
They differed as to whether he should be executed in retaliation for someone he killed, whether he repents or is captured before repenting. Atā’ and Asbagh said that he should be executed in retaliation. Mutarrif and Ibn al-Mājishūn reported from Mālik that he should neither be executed for it nor subjected to retaliation. A similar position is found in the report from