Thus, the qabāla contracts that Ibn Umar described as usury involve leasing land containing date palms and peasants for a specified quantity of produce of the same kind as its yield. For example, a man owns a village estate containing trees and land, with peasants working for him. It yields him wheat and dates after the peasants’ wages or share have been deducted. Another man then leases it from him for a known quantity of wheat, dates, or similar produce. This explains why it is called usury.

Leasing land for dirhams or dinars, however, does not fall within the category of usury at all. Whoever prohibits it regards it instead as a case of contractual uncertainty. Moreover, Ahmad did not disapprove of this arrangement when it involved bare land, because, according to one of the two positions reported from him, leasing is permissible even when the rent is produce of the same kind as the yield. This is because the tenant works the land using his own labour and resources, so the yield results from his own activity.

This differs from the case where the land contains non-Arab, non-Muslim peasants who undertake the work. The tenant contributes neither his own labour nor his resources to working it; rather, the peasants cultivate it. He pays the lease charge and collects the proceeds in return. This amounts to seeking profit through an exchange of wealth without engaging in any craft or trade, and this is usury.

A comparable case is the practice reported to have been described as usury by Ibn Umar: renting bathhouses, mills, inns, and similar properties that the tenant does not himself use, whether for trade or for practising a craft. He rents them solely to sublet them. This has been described as usury.

In sum, these contracts were not usurious on account of the date palms or the land if