until Ibn Abbas opposed them. Al-Zuhri narrated from Abdullah ibn Abdullah ibn Utbah, who said: I met Zufar ibn Aws al-Basri, and he said: Let us go to Abdullah ibn Abbas to converse with him. We came to him and spoke with him, and among his words was his statement: 'Glory be to Him Who counted the sands of Aalij in number, yet He places in an estate a half, a half, and a third! The two halves have taken the entire estate, so where is the place for the third? By Allah, if they had advanced whom Allah advanced and deferred whom Allah deferred, no inheritance issue would ever have 'awled' (increased proportionally).' Zufar asked: 'Who is he whom Allah has advanced, and who is he whom Allah has deferred?' He replied: 'He whom He lowered from one fixed share to another, that is whom Allah advanced, and he whom He lowered from a fixed share to what remains, that is whom Allah deferred.' Zufar then asked: 'Who was the first to cause inheritance issues to 'awl?' He said: 'Umar ibn al-Khattab.' I asked: 'Did you not advise him?' He said: 'I was in awe of him, for he was a man who inspired awe.' His statement, 'He whom He lowered from a fixed share [to another fixed share], that is whom Allah advanced,' means that the spouses and the mother—each of them has a fixed share, then they are veiled to another fixed share without decreasing from it. As for him whom He lowered from a fixed share to what remains, he refers to daughters and sisters; for they are assigned a fixed share, but if their brothers are with them, they inherit through 'ta'sib' (residuary status), so they receive what remains, whether it be little or much. Thus, his view was that when fixed shares crowd one another, the deficiency should be borne by the daughters and the sisters. Our position is that if each of these individuals were alone, they would take their full fixed share; therefore, when they crowd one another, they must divide [the estate] according to their rightful proportions, like creditors and legatees. Furthermore, Allah Almighty assigned the sister a half, just as He assigned the husband a half, and He assigned two sisters two-thirds, just as He assigned two-thirds to two sisters from the mother. Thus, it is not permissible to annul the fixed share of some of them, despite Allah Almighty's explicit text regarding it, based on personal opinion and arbitrary decision. Since it was not possible to fulfill them [in full], it became necessary for them to be equal in the deficiency according to their rights, like legacies and debts. It is also a consequence of Ibn Abbas’s position that an issue would arise in it