they set out a patch of adhesive so that the mouse sticks to it, then leave the animal to die of hunger and thirst. This is impermissible. If you do use such glue traps you must check them repeatedly; the moment you find a creature caught, end its life at once.

But to abandon the trap for two or three days, letting the mouse fall in and perish from thirst or starvation, puts you in danger of the Fire, for the Prophet ﷺ said, “A woman entered the Fire because of a cat she imprisoned until it died; she neither fed it nor let it go so it might eat the insects of the earth.”

The rule, then, is that whatever the Law permits or commands us to kill must be dispatched in the quickest, most direct manner possible. Take the house gecko—called sām al-abraṣ and also al-barasī—as an example: kill it, and make sure it dies with the first blow, for that is better, earns greater reward, and is easier on the creature. The same principle applies to every other being whose killing is allowed.

Included here is the person executed in retribution (qiṣāṣ). He is to be dealt with exactly as he dealt with his victim. The evidence is the case brought before the Prophet ﷺ of a woman visited by a Jew while she was wearing jewelry. He murdered her and stole the ornaments—but how did he kill her? He placed her head on one stone and crushed it with another, sandwiching her head between the two rocks. They reached her while a trace of life still remained and asked, “Who killed you? So-and-so? So-and-so?” When they mentioned the Jew she nodded in affirmation, so they apprehended the Jew.