having intercourse with her, because he had agreed to his wife’s stipulation. Thus, ‘Umar disapproved of his having intercourse with her while a stipulation concerning her remained in force.”

Al-Kirmānī related that he asked Ahmad about a man who bought a slave woman and stipulated to her owners that he would neither sell her nor give her away. Ahmad seemed to permit this. However, if they made it a condition of his purchase that, should he sell her, the seller would have the first right to buy her at that price, he must not approach her sexually. Ahmad was following the report of ‘Umar ibn al-Khattāb’s words to ‘Abd Allāh ibn Mas‘ūd. He explicitly stated in several places that, if the seller wished to sell her, he was entitled only to return her to the seller for the original price, as in rescission by mutual agreement.

Most of his later followers hold the position that invalidates this condition. They sometimes interpret his statement, “It is permissible,” to mean that the contract is permissible, although his other explicit statements make clear that he also means the “condition.” In this, he followed the account transmitted from ‘Umar, Ibn Mas‘ūd, and Zaynab, the wife of ‘Abd Allāh—three Companions.

The same applies to conditions concerning the property sold: that the buyer neither sell it nor give it away, or that he take the slave woman as a concubine, and similar conditions specifying a single purpose. Thus, ‘Umar ibn Shabba related in Akhbār ‘Uthmān that ‘Uthmān bought a house from Suhayb and stipulated that he would establish it as an endowment for Suhayb and his descendants after him.

The underlying principle is that ownership confers various powers of disposition. Just as there is consensus that part of the property sold may be excluded from the sale, and Ahmad and others permit reserving some of its benefits, he likewise permits excluding certain forms of disposition.

Accordingly, anyone who says, “This condition conflicts with what the contract entails,” is to be asked: