that this (1) be done to a false witness (2); for a liar is black-faced, so his face is blackened (3), and because he turned the testimony upside down, he is made to ride backward.

As for its upper limit, it has been said that it may not exceed ten lashes. Many scholars, however, say that it must not reach the level of the prescribed penalties. They then take two positions. Some say that it may not reach the lowest prescribed penalty: for a free person, it may not reach the lowest prescribed penalty applicable to a free person, namely forty or eighty lashes; and for a slave, it may not reach the lowest prescribed penalty applicable to a slave, namely twenty or forty lashes.

Another opinion is that, for either of them, it may not reach the prescribed penalty applicable to a slave.

Others say that, for any given offense, it may not reach the prescribed penalty for an offense of the same kind, even if it exceeds the prescribed penalty for another kind. Thus, one who takes property (4) that was not kept in secure custody may not be punished by amputation of the hand, even if he receives more lashes than the prescribed penalty for false accusation. Nor do we impose (5) upon one who commits an act short of illicit sexual intercourse the prescribed penalty for illicit sexual intercourse, even if his punishment exceeds the prescribed penalty for false accusation (6).

It is likewise narrated that Umar ibn al-Khattāb—may Allah be pleased with him—dealt with a man who made an engraving on his signet ring and thereby took money from the public treasury. He ordered that the man be given one hundred lashes, and on the second day he had him given another hundred,