ʿAbd ibn Zamʿah rose and said, “He is my brother, the son of my father’s bond-woman, born upon his bed.” The two of them then brought the matter before the Messenger of Allah, ﷺ.
Saʿd said, “O Messenger of Allah, he is my brother’s son; my brother placed him in my charge.” ʿAbd ibn Zamʿah repeated, “He is my brother, the son of my father’s bond-woman, born upon his bed.”
The Messenger of Allah, ﷺ, ruled, “He is yours, ʿAbd ibn Zamʿah.” He added, “The child belongs to the (marital) bed, and the fornicator receives nothing but the stone.” He then said to Sawdah bint Zamʿah, “Veil yourself from him,” for he had noticed the child’s resemblance to ʿUtbah ibn Abī Waqqāṣ.
Sawdah later said, “He never saw me again until he met Allah, Mighty and Majestic.” Thus the Messenger of Allah, ﷺ, awarded the boy to ʿAbd ibn Zamʿah as his brother and affirmed his lineage on the basis of that acknowledgment, provided no other heir contested it.
Most jurists, however, have found the meaning of this ḥadīth problematic, viewing it as a departure from the unanimously accepted principle for establishing lineage. They therefore offered various explanations. The ḥadīth’s surface meaning is that the Prophet, ﷺ, confirmed the boy’s lineage solely on his brother’s acknowledgment, whereas the rule is that no lineage is established without the testimony of two upright witnesses. Hence the scholars proposed several interpretations:
A group said that the Prophet, ﷺ, accepted the brother’s statement because he (the Prophet) might already have known that the bond-woman was exclusively intimate with Zamʿah ibn Qays and was therefore part of his lawful bed. They added that the Prophet was Zamʿah’s in-law—Sawdah bint Zamʿah was his wife—so the matter would not have been hidden from him. This reading assumes that a judge may rule according to personal knowledge, a view incompatible with the Mālikī school (which forbids such judgments) but in harmony with one of the two opinions of al-Shāfiʿī—the one that does not establish lineage (without formal proof).
Those who adopted this view further said that his order for Sawdah to veil herself was merely precautionary, owing to the suspected resemblance, not a binding duty. On this basis some Shāfiʿīs have stated that a husband may require his wife to veil herself from her brother.
Another group argued that the command for Sawdah to veil proves the Prophet did not attribute the boy’s lineage to ʿUtbah—neither by Utbah’s own claim nor by any personal knowledge of the marital bed.
These scholars then differed over the phrase “He is yours.” One group maintained that it meant, “He is your slave,” given that he was the son of your father’s bond-woman. This, however, conflicts with the Prophet’s stated rationale: “The child belongs to the bed and the fornicator receives the stone.”
Al-Ṭaḥāwī said that the words “He is yours, ʿAbd ibn Zamʿah” meant: your legal hand over him is like the finder’s hand over lost property. Yet such interpretations are weakened by the Prophet’s explicit statement and reasoning: “The child belongs to the bed and the fornicator receives the stone.”
As for the argument on which the Shāfiʿīs rely in this issue, it is that the acknowledgment made by the one who takes possession of an estate is an acknowledgment made in succession to the deceased—that is, the heir speaks in the deceased’s stead. Others regard it merely as testimonial acknowledgment, not succession-based acknowledgment, holding that the deceased’s own acknowledgment does not transfer to the heir who now holds his estate.