Muwatta, Book of Inheritance Shares (faraid)

The Book of Inheritance Shares (Faraid) is the thirteenth book of the Muwatta in the transmission of Yahya ibn Yahya al-Laythi from Malik ibn Anas, in the edition of Bashshar Awwad Ma'ruf (1997), and it is the first book of the second volume. It occupies pages 5 to 26 of the PDF pagination, and contains 40 numbered texts (1449–1488) in fifteen chapters. It concerns inheritance shares: the shares of children, spouses, parents, siblings and grandparents and grandmothers, the kalala, the inheritance of the agnatic relatives, the people of other religions, and the case of one whose status is unknown. ^{1 2}

• The fixed heirs (1449–1458): a child's inheritance from his parents; the inheritance of spouses; the inheritance of father and mother from their child; the inheritance of full, consanguine and uterine siblings; and the inheritance of the grandfather. ^{1 3}
• Grandmothers and the kalala (1459–1468): the ruling on the grandmother, the mother's mother and the father's mother; the judgement of Abu Bakr and Umar on the sixth share; and that the kalala is of two kinds. ^{4 5}
• The paternal aunt and the guardianship of the agnatic heirs (1469–1473): Umar's letter on the case of the paternal aunt, and the order of the agnatic heirs from the full brother to the son of the paternal uncle, and the patronage of clients. ^{6 7}
• Those who have no inheritance, and the people of other religions (1474–1481): those who do not inherit by kinship; that a Muslim does not inherit from a disbeliever; and Umar's judgement on the inheritance of the protected people. ^{7 8}
• The one whose status is unknown, and children of li'an (1482–1488): the inheritance of those who died together; the case where it is not known which of them died first; and the children of li'an and the children of fornication. ^{8 2}

Malik often begins with the phrase "the matter agreed upon among us, on which there is no disagreement, and on which I found the scholars of our city", making the practice of the people of Medina his basis. He cites the verses of al-Nisa', al-Baqara, al-Anfal and al-Ahzab, refers to the judgements of the early Companions such as Abu Bakr, Umar and Zayd ibn Thabit (may God be pleased with him), and mentions the disagreement over the grandmother and the grandfather. ^{1 5}

The editor records the transmitters from Malik, and quotes Ibn Abd al-Barr on disconnected and connected transmission. He notes that al-Tirmidhi held that the correct narrator of the hadith "a Muslim does not inherit from a disbeliever" is Amr ibn Uthman (may God be pleased with him), not Umar, and that most of the Muwatta's transmitters said as Yahya said. He also notes that the hadith on the kalala is disconnected in Yahya's transmission. ^{9 5}

Each text of the book has its own record. It gives the highest narrator and the chapter of the text, presents the substance of the report in the museum's wording, and records the editor's takhrij where it is needed. See Inheritance shares for the places where the book's rulings appear. ¹