In the name of Allah, the compassionate the merciful
It is to be noted that the Aathar (sayings of the sahabah), has related that, when the prophet arrived in Madinah in 622 CE, he permanently abrogated approximately 30 different financial and economic transactions that were being practised by the people, due to one or more invalid or prohibited elements involved in them.
A Batil contract is a void or invalid contract that does not fulfil the conditions relating to the offer and acceptance, subject matter, or the consideration and possession or delivery of the subject matter or involves some illegal external attributes like the involvement of Riba (interest), Gharar (uncertainty), or Qimar (gambling).
The scholars of the Hanafi school of thought refer to an invalid contract as a Fasid contract. Today, Insha Allah we will list about 13 of them and explain. They are as follows:
Bai al Dayn: Sale of debt or sale of debt instruments at a discount.
Bai al-Ghaib: Sale of absent or concealed goods (without knowing their features and specifications.
Bai al Hasat: a sale where the subject matter depends on the fall of a stone or pebble.
Bai al Inah: Double sale by which the borrower and the lender sell and then resell an object between them, once for cash and then for a higher credit price, with the net result of a loan with interest prohibited due to interest.
Bai al-Majhul: A sale in which the object of sale or its price or the time of payment remains unknown, and unspecified, lacking any material information.
Bai al Muallaq: a suspended sale where the effectiveness of the transaction is related to any future condition or action.
Bai wal Salaf: A conditional contract combining selling and lending, like one man saying to another: “I purchase your goods for such and such if you lend me such and such.
Ghaban Fahish: Excessive profiteering with deception, a person sells a commodity stating explicitly or giving the impression that he is charging the market price, but actually, he is charging an exorbitant price taking benefit of the ignorance of the purchaser. In such cases, the purchaser has the option to revoke the sale and get back the price paid.
Habal al-Hablah: Sale of what is in the womb of an animal, a sale where the subject matter is not known.
Hilah: tricks used in transactions to circumvent the basic prohibitions.
Jahl or Jahala: Ignorance, lack of knowledge, indefiniteness in a contract, non-clarity about the parties. A contract where the rights and obligations of parties, the goods / subject matter, or the price consideration are not clear enough.
Maysir/ Qimar: gambling or any game of chance.
Mulamasah: sale by touching the subject matter or its carton without knowing its details.
Tabzir: spendthrift
Khalabah: a type of marketing that is misleading to the purchaser.
Munabadhah: the last but not the least, a type of sale where a man throws a garment to another man in exchange for a garment that the other throws to him without both of them examining them.
In a nutshell, all the financial transactions mentioned above, are not Shariah compliant because they lack vital elements such as kasb (taking calculated risk), algum bilgurum (accepting risk to benefit from profit), value-added, real economic activity, and so on. Hence, they are considered as Batil or Fasid economic and financial transactions.
And Allah knows best! “Praise be to Allah in whose favour good deeds are accomplished” (ibn Majah 3803).
May Allah accept this from us and make it sadaqat jaariyah.
YAHAYA ILIASU MUSTAPHA
The writer is an Islamic Banking and Finance patron and advocate in Ghana.
Email: yahaya0246873726@gmail.com
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