al-Mundhir. I do not know of any dissent regarding this. This is because when two people differ over an object and neither of them has evidence, the statement is that of the person in whose possession it is, along with his oath. If it is in both their hands, the possession of each of them is over half of it; therefore, the statement is his regarding his half along with his oath. If one of them has evidence, it is judged in his favor. If each of them has evidence, they negate each other, and they become like those who have no evidence. If they have no evidence and refuse to swear the oath, the wall remains in their hands as it was. If one of them swears and the other refuses, judgment is passed against the one who refused, and the entirety belongs to the other.

If the wall is bonded to the structure of one of them but not the other, it belongs to him along with his oath. This is the opinion of Abu Hanifa and al-Shafi'i. Abu Thawr said: It is not given preference by the bonding, and no consideration is given to it. Our evidence is that the appearance (al-zahir) is that this construction was built entirely as one structure; if a part of it belongs to a man, the rest is his. The other masonry that is bonded, the appearance is that it was built alone, for if it had been built with this, it would be connected to it. Thus, the appearance is that it belongs to someone other than the owner of this wall under dispute, so he found something to be favored by, like possession and the 'azaj (vault). If it is said: Why then did you not grant it to him without an oath on account of that? We say: Because that is an appearance, not a certainty, for it is possible that one of them built the wall for his companion as an act of charity along with his own wall, or that it belonged to him and he gifted it to him, or he built it for a fee. Thus, the oath was legislated due to this possibility, just as it was legislated in the right of the one in possession and all others upon whom an oath is incumbent. As for if it is bonded to the construction of one of them with a bonding that could have been created later—such as building with bricks or masonry—it is possible to remove half a brick or stone from the built wall and place in its stead a sound brick or stone that is bonded between the two walls. Al-Qadi said: It is not given preference by this, due to the possibility that [the owner of the wall] did this in order to claim ownership of the joint wall. The apparent meaning of the words of al-Khiraqi is that it is given preference by this connection, just as it is given preference by the connection that cannot be created later, because the appearance is that the owner of the wall would not allow another to dispose of it by removing his masonry,