as an exclusive hired worker is. Most jurists, including Abū Hanīfah, Mālik, and Ahmad, permit such workers to form partnerships. They regard this as equivalent to a “credit partnership,” in which one partner purchases something for himself and his partner on the strength of his standing, just as a partner undertakes work on behalf of himself and his partner.

They explain that this partnership rests on agency: each partner acts for himself by virtue of ownership and for his partner as an agent. Al-Shāfi‘ī does not permit it, following his principle that a partnership cannot be established by contract; rather, his school recognizes only partnerships consisting of joint ownership. Thus, when two people jointly own property, they share its returns and bear its liabilities. Accordingly, he does not permit an ‘inān partnership when the two capital contributions are of different kinds. He permits it only when the two contributions are mixed together, and he requires profits to be apportioned strictly in proportion to those contributions.

The majority disagree with him on this. They maintain that partnerships are of two types: “partnerships of joint ownership” and “contractual partnerships.” A contractual partnership does not, in principle, require joint ownership, just as joint ownership does not require a contractual partnership, although the two may coexist. There is scholarly consensus that a profit-sharing investment partnership is a contractual partnership, not a partnership of joint ownership, since one party provides the capital and the other the labor. The same applies to orchard-tending and sharecropping partnerships, although some jurists maintain that these fall under hiring contracts and run contrary to legal analogy.