it must be dispatched by nahr—piercing at the base of the neck—when nahr is the required form of sacrifice, and by ordinary slaughter when slaughter is required; or by either method if the animal is of a kind for which both are permissible.

Abū Ḥanīfah and al-Shāfiʿī maintained that when a runaway camel cannot be reached in order to perform the prescribed slaughter, it may be killed like game.

Their disagreement stems from a clash between general principle and prophetic report. The guiding principle in this chapter is that a domesticated animal becomes lawful to eat only through slaughter or nahr, whereas a wild animal becomes lawful through wounding beyond recovery (al-ʿaqr). The report that appears to override these principles is the ḥadīth of Rāfiʿ ibn Khadīj, in which he related:

“A camel bolted, and the company had but a few horses. They pursued it, but it wore them out. Then a man aimed an arrow at it, and by that arrow God restrained the camel. The Prophet—peace and blessings be upon him—said, ‘These beasts sometimes behave like the wild; so treat the one that escapes you in this manner.’”

Acting upon this ḥadīth is preferable, owing to its sound transmission, and there is no need to regard it as a mere exception to the established rule. One might even say that it accords with the rule, for the reason al-ʿaqr suffices as a form of slaughter in certain animals is nothing more than the impossibility of performing the normal sacrifice, not simply their being wild by nature. Whenever that same impossibility arises with a domesticated animal, its legally valid sacrifice may follow the rule for wild game, so that analogy and transmitted evidence coincide.

[Chapter Two: The Instruments by Which Hunting Is Performed]

The foundations of this chapter are two Qur’anic verses and two ḥadīths.

First, the verse: “O you who believe, Allah will surely test you with something of the game that your hands and your spears can reach” (al-Māʾidah 5:94).

Second, His saying: “Say, the good things have been made lawful for you, as well as what your trained hunting animals catch for you” (al-Māʾidah 5:4).

Of the two ḥadīths, the first is the report of ʿAdiyy ibn Ḥātim, wherein the Messenger of Allah—may Allah bless him and grant him peace—said to him:

“When you send forth your trained dogs, mentioning Allah’s name over them, eat of what they catch for you. But if the dog eats from it, do not eat, for I fear it may have caught it for itself. If other dogs mingle with yours, do not eat, for you pronounced Allah’s name over your own dog, not over the others.”

He also asked about the miʿrāḍ (a throwing stick), and the Prophet replied:

“If it strikes with its flat side, do not eat, for that is a killing blow, not a proper slaughter.”

This ḥadīth is a primary basis for much that appears in this book.

The second ḥadīth is that of Abū Thaʿlabah al-Khushanī, in which he—peace and blessings be upon him—said:

“Whatever you hit with your bow—after pronouncing Allah’s name—eat of it; and whatever you catch with your untrained dog, then reach it alive and slaughter it, eat of it.”