Chapter: Acknowledgment

Shaykh al-Islām—may Allah sanctify his soul—was asked:

“A man acknowledged that the entire shop known as his residence, together with all the tangible property it contained, was an endowment dedicated to Allah Most High for a mosque and its appurtenances.

“The witnesses were unable to weigh those items before the founder of the endowment died. Some of the witnesses do not know whether the items covered by that acknowledgment are the very items now present. May such a witness give this testimony in reliance on the declarant’s acknowledgment and on what has become widely known through those two upright witnesses?”

He replied:

“The witness testifies to what he heard the declarant say. An acknowledgment is valid whether its subject matter is known or unknown, distinguishable or indistinguishable. If further testimony establishes precisely what was included in the wording, that is admissible, and their testimony is acted upon.

“For example, someone might acknowledge, ‘I owe so-and-so, son of so-and-so, such-and-such,’ or, ‘My house known as such-and-such, or defined by such-and-such boundaries, belongs to so-and-so.’ Two witnesses might then testify that this particular person or property is the one named, described, or defined by those boundaries. This is permissible by agreement of the imams.

“They differed only concerning the person providing the identification: does one suffice, or are two required? There are two well-known scholarly opinions on this, both transmitted from Imam Ahmad. The ‘second’ view is that of al-Shāfiʿī and others. And Allah knows best.”