—namely, whether crop and orchard sharecropping are permissible. There are two well-known views:

The first is that they are not permissible. Those who hold this view regard them as a form of leasing or hiring in return for an unspecified payment. Some therefore invalidate them without exception, as Abū Hanīfa does. Others make exceptions where there is a need: they permit orchard sharecropping because trees, unlike land, cannot be leased. They also permit crop sharecropping on land containing trees as an adjunct to orchard sharecropping, either without restriction, as al-Shāfi'ī holds, or provided that the open ground constitutes no more than one-third, as Mālik holds. Some permit orchard sharecropping without restriction, as Mālik does and as al-Shāfi'ī did in his earlier position. In his later position, however, al-Shāfi'ī restricted its permissibility to date palms and grapevines.

The second view permits both orchard and crop sharecropping. Its proponents maintain that these are partnerships, a distinct category from leasing or hiring, in which the extent of the benefit and the payment must be specified. In these partnership contracts, the work is not itself the objective; rather, the objective is the yield that the two parties share. One contributes the use of his property, and the other contributes his physical labor. The same applies to capital-and-labor partnerships.

Accordingly, if the parties to these contracts part ways, the worker is entitled to the customary share of the profit for someone in his position—whether one-third or one-half—not to the customary wage for his work. This view is unquestionably correct, and the Companions unanimously agreed upon it.