and he dies from the circumcision; or a physician gives a patient medicine and he dies from it, cauterizes him and he dies from the cauterization, or removes part of his body and he dies from its removal; or a cupper extracts a man’s molar and the man dies. In all these cases, neither the practitioner personally nor his ‘āqila (the group collectively liable for blood money) bears financial liability. This is because such procedures entail an inherent risk to the person or thing concerned, so it is as though its owner himself exposed it to what befell it. This applies when the practitioner makes no error in performing the procedure. If, however, he does make an error—for example, the physician gives the patient medicine unsuitable for his illness; the circumciser’s hand, or that of someone performing an excision, slips and cuts beyond the proper limit; the cauterizer’s hand slips and cauterizes beyond the proper limit; or the cupper’s hand slips and he extracts a molar other than the one he was instructed to extract—then one of two situations applies:

First: he lacks the requisite expertise and misrepresents his competence.

Second: he possesses the requisite expertise and does not misrepresent his competence.

If he possesses the requisite expertise and has not misrepresented his competence, this constitutes accidental harm for which his ‘āqila is liable, unless the compensation is less than one-third of the full blood money, in which case he must pay it from his own wealth. If, however, he lacks the necessary skill and has misrepresented his competence, the ruler must punish him by beating and imprisonment. There is disagreement concerning the blood money. One view is that he must pay it from his own wealth, with his ‘āqila bearing none of it. This is the apparent meaning of Mālik’s statement in the transmissions of Ibn al-Qāsim and Ashhab in the Book of Government. ‘Īsā ibn Dīnār, expressing his own opinion, said that this constitutes accidental harm and that his ‘āqila is liable if the compensation amounts to one-third or more. This is also Asbagh’s transmission from Ibn al-Qāsim in the Book of Blood Money. Concerning a physician who gives medicine to a Christian or a Muslim who then dies from it, he said: “He owes nothing unless it is known that he intended to kill him.” This is to be understood as meaning that the blood money is payable by his ‘āqila, as Ibn Dīnār held.

Section

If an artisan stipulates that he is to bear no liability, this stipulation does not avail him, and he remains liable. This is Mālik’s view—may Allah have mercy on him—in al-Mudawwana and in Ashhab’s transmission in the Book of Artisans’ Liability in al-‘Utbiyya. According to this view, he should receive the customary fee for comparable work, since he only agreed to the fee