5- This forms part of the neighbor’s rights, which the Lawgiver has urged us to honor and extend kindness toward. From it we realize the magnitude of those rights and the duty to observe them.
Accordingly, other instances of mutual benefit are to be analogized to the placement of the beam: whenever neighbors require some advantage and granting it causes the owner no appreciable harm, he is obliged to grant it, and it is forbidden for him to withhold it.
Disagreement among the jurists
The scholars unanimously agree that a person may not place his beam on his neighbor’s wall when harm would ensue, except with the latter’s permission, citing the Messenger’s ﷺ statement: “There is to be neither harming nor reciprocating harm.”
They differed, however, when no injury befalls the wall’s owner and the neighbor genuinely needs the beam—for example, he cannot roof his house without it.
The three imams—Abu Hanifah, Malik, and al-Shafiʿi in the well-known view—held that it is impermissible to rest the beam on the neighbor’s wall without the wall owner’s consent; if he declines, he cannot be forced.
They reasoned from the basic rule forbidding the use of another’s property without his approval, such as the hadith, “The property of a Muslim is unlawful (for another) except with his willing consent,” and the hadith, “Your blood, your wealth, and your honor are inviolable,” and similar proofs.
Imam Ahmad, Ishaq, and the scholars of hadith, by contrast, maintained that the wall must be made available to the neighbor when he needs it and the harm to the owner is slight; if the owner refuses, he may be compelled.
Some Malikis adopted this view as well, and it is also reported from Abu Hanifah and is the old position of al-Shafiʿi. Their evidence is as follows:
1- The plain wording of the hadith under discussion is a prohibition, and prohibition indicates unlawfulness. If refusing the neighbor is unlawful, then granting the concession is obligatory.
2- Abu Hurayrah, who narrated the hadith, expressed disapproval at people’s failure to act upon it and threatened to enforce it. This shows his understanding that conceding the right is obligatory and that refusal is forbidden—the narrator is most familiar with the meaning of what he narrates.