and there is no usury between currencies and trade goods. As for selling it for cash, then buying it for another cash currency—such as selling it for two hundred dirhams, then buying it for ten dinars—our companions have said: It is permissible, because they are two [different] types, and an inequality (tafadul) between them is not prohibited. Thus it is permissible, just as if he had bought it with a trade good or for the equivalent of its price. Abu Hanifah said: It is not permissible, by way of istihsan (preferential derivation), because they are like the same thing in the sense of being money, and because this is taken as a means to usury, so it resembles the case where he sells it for the same type as the original price. [And this is more correct, if Allah the Exalted wills].
Section: This issue is called the issue of al-inah (the repurchase of an item for a lower price on credit). The poet said:
Do we take on debt or do we trade on credit, or does there step forth for us A youth like the edge of a sword, whose sharpness is distinguished?
His words "na'tanu" mean we buy on inah... like what we have described. Abu Dawud recorded in his Sunan, with his chain of transmission from Ibn Umar, who said: I heard the Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings of Allah be upon him, say: "When you engage in transactions of inah, and you hold onto the tails of cattle, and you are satisfied with agriculture, and you abandon jihad, Allah will inflict upon you a humiliation that He will not remove until you return to your religion." This is a warning that indicates prohibition. It has been narrated from Ahmad that he said: Inah is for a man to have merchandise and he refuses to sell it except on credit; if he sells it for cash and on credit, then there is no harm. He also said: I dislike for a man to have no trade other than inah, [and] not to sell for cash. Ibn Aqil said: He only disliked the sale on credit because of its resemblance to usury, for it is usually the case that the one who sells on credit intends to gain an increase due to the delay. It is possible that inah could be a name for this specific issue and for selling on credit altogether, but selling on credit is not prohibited by consensus, nor is it disliked, unless...
(4) Omitted from the original manuscript (al-asl). (5) Ibn Manzur attributed it in Lisan al-Arab (d-y-n) to Shamir. (6) In the Lisan: "huzzat madaribuha" (its edges were brandished). And "nadan" means we take on debt. (7) Omitted from the original manuscript (al-asl). (8) In: The Chapter on the Prohibition of Inah, from the Book of Sales. Sunan Abi Dawud 2/246. It was also recorded by Imam Ahmad in: Al-Musnad 2/42, 84.
