Regarding the redemption of the children, there are three issues. The first is its timing: this occurs at the time of the child's birth. Umar, Ali, and Ibn Abbas, may Allah be pleased with them, ruled accordingly, and this is the opinion of Al-Shafi'i. Abu Thawr, Al-Thawri, and the People of Reason said: He guarantees them based on their value on the day of the dispute, because he only guarantees them due to the act of preventing [the master from them], and he only prevented them at the time of the dispute. Our position is that the child is judged to be free at the moment of birth, so he must guarantee them at that time, because their enslavement was lost from that moment. Furthermore, the value that increases after birth was not owned by the master of the slave girl, so he does not guarantee it, just as is the case after the dispute. If it is said: 'But the child was judged to be free while still a fetus,' we respond: It was not possible to impose a guarantee then due to the lack of value and the inability to ascertain it, so we imposed the guarantee at the first possible moment, which is the time of birth.

The second issue is the nature of the redemption, and there are three narrations regarding it. The first is that it is by their value, which is the opinion of the majority of jurists, based on the Prophet's (peace be upon him) statement: 'Whoever emancipates a portion of a slave, the portion of his partner shall be valued against him.' Also, animals are among the items that have an estimated value (mutaqawwamat), not among those that have exact equivalents (dhawat al-amthal), so it is obligatory to guarantee them by their value, just as if one had destroyed them. The second is that he guarantees them with equivalents in the form of slaves—a male for a male, and a female for a female—based on what Sa'id ibn al-Musayyib narrated: A slave girl belonging to a man from the Arabs fled and joined some of the Arabs, and a man from the Banu Udhra married her. Her master then followed, took her back, and took her children as well. They brought their dispute to Umar [ibn al-Khattab], may Allah be pleased with him, and he ruled for the Udhri man that he should redeem his children with a ghurra (a compensation), head for head, a boy for a boy, and a girl for a girl.