guaranteed. If less is lost, the retaliator is entitled to the blood money (diya) for what remains, because he has not fulfilled his replacement.

Section: If he cuts the tongue of a young child who has not yet spoken due to his infancy, its blood money (diya) is due. This is the opinion of al-Shāfiʿī. Abū Ḥanīfa said: It is not due, because it is a tongue without speech, so no blood money is due for it, like the tongue of a mute person. Our argument is that its outward state is soundness, and he has not spoken only because he does not yet know how to speak, so the blood money is due for it just as it is for an adult. It differs from a mute person, for it is known [about the mute] that he is paralyzed—do you not see that his limbs do not grasp? Yet, blood money is due for them. If he reaches an age where someone like him would speak, but he does not, and [the offender] cuts his tongue, the blood money is not due, because the outward state is that he is unable to speak, and what is due for it is what is due for the tongue of a mute person. If he grows up and articulates some letters, it is due in proportion to the number of letters that were lost, because we have clarified that he was a speaker. If he has reached an age where he should move by crying and otherwise, yet he does not move, and a cutter cuts it, there is no blood money for it, because the outward state is that if he were healthy, he would have moved. If he has not yet reached an age where he would move, the blood money is due for it, because the outward state is his soundness. If he cuts the tongue of an adult and claims that he was mute, the same rules apply as we mentioned regarding the disagreement over the paralysis of the severed limb, according to what we have previously stated.

Section: If he commits an offense against him and his speech or taste is lost, then it returns, the blood money is not due, because we have determined that it was not actually lost—and if it had been lost, it would not have returned—and if he had already taken the blood money, he must return it. If he cuts his tongue and it returns, the blood money is also not due, and if he had taken it, he must return it. Abū Bakr stated this. The manifest position of the school of al-Shāfiʿī is that he does not return the blood money, because custom has not established its return, and the peculiarity of this [case] in its return indicates that it is a renewed gift. Our argument is that what the blood money was due for has returned, so it is necessary to return the blood money, like teeth and everything else that returns. If a person cuts half of his tongue and all of his speech is lost, then another cuts the remainder and his speech returns, he is not obligated to return the blood money, because the speech that was via the tongue has been lost and did not return to the tongue, rather it returned in another location, unlike the previous case.