There is no difference in this ruling whether the pledged property is the very article sold or something other than it. A report from Ibn al-Qāsim states that such a stipulation is impermissible, because it prevents the purchaser from disposing of the commodity for an extended period during which the seller is not entitled to reserve any benefit; consequently, the sale itself must be deemed invalid. For the same reason Ibn al-Mawwāz held that it is permitted only when the period is brief.
Among the transmitted texts on this topic is the Prophet’s—peace and blessings be upon him—prohibition of “a sale combined with a loan.” The jurists unanimously classify this as a corrupt (fāsid) transaction. They then differed over the case in which the condition is dropped before the buyer takes possession. Abū Ḥanīfah, al-Shāfiʿī, and the rest of the scholars still prohibit it, whereas Mālik and his companions—apart from Muḥammad ibn ʿAbd al-Ḥakam—allow it, although another report from Mālik agrees with the majority. The majority argue that the very prohibition implies the invalidity of the act in question, and that the price remains unknown because it is coupled with a loan.
It is related that Muḥammad ibn Aḥmad ibn Sahl al-Barmakī asked Ismāʿīl ibn Isḥāq al-Mālikī about this issue, saying: “What difference is there between combining a sale with a loan and the case of a man who sells a slave for one hundred dinars and a wineskin, and after concluding the contract says, ‘I forgo the wineskin’?” He added, “Such a sale is unanimously void according to the scholars.” Ismāʿīl replied with an answer that carries no probative force: “The distinction is that the party who stipulated the loan is free either to abandon it or to insist upon it, unlike the wineskin case.” Yet this is precisely what requires explanation, for one may ask: “Why is he granted an option here, whereas he is not allowed simply to drop the wineskin and validate the sale?”
The sounder answer is that the prohibition here is not due to anything intrinsically unlawful—the loan itself is permissible—but rather because the sale is conjoined with the loan. Likewise, the sale by itself is lawful, and it is only the addition of that condition that renders it impermissible. In the wineskin case, by contrast, the sale is forbidden because it is coupled with something intrinsically unlawful, not merely because of a condition.
The crux of the matter is this: when a sale becomes invalid on account of a condition, does the invalidity disappear once the condition is removed, or does it persist—just as the defect that befalls an otherwise lawful sale through association with something intrinsically prohibited does not lapse? This, in turn, rests on another principle: is the defect purely formal (ḥukmī) or rationally intelligible (maʿqūl)? If it is formal, it does not vanish when the condition is lifted; if it is intelligible, it does. Mālik regarded it as intelligible, whereas the majority considered it formal. Most of the defects found in usurious or gharar-based transactions are, in their estimation, purely formal; hence such contracts never take effect at all, even if the interest is later waived or the uncertainty removed. They also disagree about the ruling when such a contract is nevertheless executed, as will be discussed under the rules governing invalid sales.
Within this same category falls the ʿurbān sale. The majority of scholars across the regions hold it to be impermissible, though a number of the Successors allowed it—among them Mujāhid, Ibn Sīrīn, Nāfiʿ ibn al-Ḥārith, and Zayd ibn Aslam.