several jurists of our school, including Abū Muhammad. They mention no disagreement on this issue and make no distinction between field crops and fruit, because the Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him,

“forbade selling grapes until they turn dark and grain until it hardens.”

Selling grapes after they turn dark is thus like selling grain after it hardens. Between the hardening of the grain and its readiness for harvest, there is an interval during which a calamity may strike it.

Some jurists of our school said that plants which bear repeated crops—such as snake cucumbers, cucumbers, and similar vegetables and greens—are treated like trees, and their produce like tree fruit, in this respect. This is because the plants themselves may validly be sold, whether small or large, bearing produce or not.

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This applies when the fruit perishes before it has fully ripened and reached harvest time. If the purchaser leaves it until harvest time and it then perishes, the same ruling applies according to the jurists of our school. It is reported from Mālik that the loss falls upon the purchaser. Al-Shāfiʿī has two positions on the matter. The issue is that the seller has no remaining obligation of delivery, while the purchaser has committed no negligence, whether specific or general, since leaving the fruit until this time is an entitlement arising from the contract. The jurists of our school therefore take into account the purchaser’s inability to take full possession and his lack of negligence, whereas the opposing view takes into account the seller’s having delivered the fruit and made it available to the purchaser.

But if the purchaser leaves it until the time for removing it has passed and it has fully ripened, and it then perishes: