and of Ibn 'Aqīl, one of Ahmad’s followers—is that it is permissible. Some interpret Ahmad’s prohibition as indicating mere disapproval, for he said, “It resembles currency exchange.”

The stronger view, however, is that it is prohibited, because copper coins in circulation are predominantly governed by the rules applicable to money and serve as a measure of people’s wealth. The ruler should therefore mint coins for them at a fair value for their transactions, without wronging them. Those in authority must not trade in copper coins at all, whether by buying copper, minting it into coins and trading in them, or by banning the coins people already possess and minting different ones for them. Rather, whatever coins he mints should be issued at their actual value, without profit, for the public benefit, and he should pay the mint workers’ wages from the public treasury.

Trading in these coins opens a major door to oppressing people and consuming their wealth unjustly. If he prohibits transactions in them, reducing them to mere commodities, and mints other coins for people, he damages the wealth they possess by lowering its value, thereby wronging them. He also wrongs them by exchanging the coins at an inflated rate.

Moreover, when copper coins differ in size, this enables oppressors to take smaller coins, exchange them, transfer them to another town, and put the smaller ones into circulation, thus damaging people’s wealth. It is reported in the Sunan collections that the Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, “forbade breaking the Muslims’ coinage that circulates among them, unless it has some defect.”

If the coins are of a uniform standard and valued at the price of copper, and the ruler does not buy copper and coins no longer in circulation to mint into coins and profit from doing so, their intended purpose is achieved