is invalid by consensus, just as it would be to stipulate a fixed sum of dirhams in a profit-sharing partnership, or the profit from one particular class of goods.

Orchard-tending partnerships, sharecropping, and profit-sharing partnerships are not forms of hire in which the work and remuneration must be specified, for in hire contracts the work itself is the object. Rather, these arrangements are forms of partnership: one party contributes his labor and the other the use of his property, and both share in the gains and losses.

The households of Abū Bakr, ʿUmar, and Ibn Masʿūd all practiced sharecropping. This has been the practice of Muslims from the time of their Prophet until today. It was more widespread among them than leasing land for dirhams and dinars, for it is further removed from injustice and deception, and closer to the justice upon which transactions are founded.

As for the cost of the harvesters, it falls upon whoever the two parties stipulate should bear it. If they stipulate that both should bear the cost, it falls upon both; if they stipulate that one of them should bear it, it falls upon that party. If no stipulation is made, there is disagreement. They may divide both the grain and the straw between them. And Allah knows best.

He—may Allah have mercy on him—was asked:

About a man who leased land in return for a share of its crop and took possession of it, but did not cultivate it: is the owner entitled to charge him the customary rent for comparable land?