It has three levels of meaning.

The first is its application to anyone who provides a benefit in return for compensation. This includes the bridal due, as in Allah’s words:

“For whatever enjoyment you have had from them, give them their due compensation.”

This applies whether the work involved is specified or unspecified, and whether the consideration is specified or unspecified, binding or nonbinding.

The second level is hiring in the sense of a reward contract: the benefit is unspecified, but the compensation is guaranteed. This is a revocable, nonbinding contract, as when someone says, “Whoever returns my slave to me will receive such-and-such.” He might return him from somewhere far away or nearby.

The third is leasing or hiring in its restricted sense: leasing a particular asset or engaging someone to perform work for which he is contractually liable, with the benefit specified. The remuneration is therefore specified, and the contract is binding. This is the form of leasing or hiring that resembles a sale in most of its rulings. When later jurists use the term ijārah without qualification, or speak of the “Chapter on Leasing and Hiring,” this is what they mean.

Thus, concerning orchard-tending partnerships, sharecropping, profit-sharing partnerships and similar arrangements for sharing an increase that is produced: whoever calls them ijārah in its broadest or broad sense is correct. Whoever calls them ijārah in its restricted sense is mistaken. And if they constitute ijārah