as Rāfi‘ ibn Khadīj also explained in the two Sahīh collections.

As for calling a sharecropping arrangement muzāra‘a when the seed is supplied by the owner, and mukhābara when it is supplied by the cultivator, this is a claim without evidence. It is like the names these people and their forefathers have devised, for which Allah has sent down no authority. For Sahīh al-Bukhārī records from Ibn ‘Umar:

“Allah’s Messenger, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, made an agreement with the people of Khaybar for half of the fruit and crops it produced, on condition that they cultivate it at their own expense.”

The prohibited form of mukhābara did not involve the cultivator supplying the seed.

The point here is that the Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, prohibited a partnership—which constitutes leasing land in the broad sense—when it stipulated that the landowner should receive the produce of a particular plot. The matter is as al-Layth ibn Sa‘d said, as recorded by al-Bukhārī: what the Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, prohibited was something that anyone versed in what is lawful and unlawful would recognize as unlawful upon considering it—or words to that effect.

This is because partnerships and contractual dealings require fairness to both parties: they share in gains and losses after each has recovered his original capital. If the produce of a particular plot is stipulated for one of them, it is reserved exclusively for him, while the rest of the crop may not survive. This would wrong one of the partners. It also involves contractual uncertainty and gambling.

The same principle underlies the scholars’ statement, on which I know of no dissent: it is impermissible to stipulate that either party should receive the fruit of a particular tree or a fixed quantity of fruit. Likewise, one may not