settles with him regarding what he admitted for compensation, the settlement is valid, and his brother has the right to exercise pre-emption (shuf'a). It is possible to differentiate between cases where the denial was absolute, and cases where he said: "This belongs to us both; we inherited it together from our father or our brother." It is said: If the denial was absolute, he has the right of pre-emption, but if he said, "We inherited it from our father," he has no pre-emption because the denier claims that the ownership of his brother, the one who admitted, has not ceased, and that the settlement is invalid; he is held to that and does not deserve pre-emption by it. The view for the first (case) is that ownership was established for the claimant by legal judgment; it returned to the one who admitted through a sale, and he acknowledges that it is a valid sale, so pre-emption is established in it, just as if the denial were absolute. It is possible that the share of the one who admitted was transferred to the claimant by a sale, a gift, or some other cause, so the denial of the denier and the admission of the one who admitted do not contradict each other, as in the case of absolute denial. This is the more correct view.

819 - Issue: He said: (If two people claim a wall constructed with the masonry of both of them, they are to take mutual oaths, and it shall be between them. The same applies if it is bonded with their building. If it is constructed with the building of one of them, it belongs to him along with his oath.)

The general principle regarding this is that if two men claim a wall between their properties, and they are equal in the fact that it is bonded to both their structures—which is that it is joined to them in a way that cannot be brought about after the wall has been built, such as the connection of the construction with mud, like these partitions where it is impossible to bring about a connection of some of them with others—or they are equal in that it is bonded to their construction, or not connected to their construction with the aforementioned connection, but rather there is an elongated gap between them, as exists between two walls when one is placed against the other, then they are equal in the claim. If neither of them has evidence, they are to take mutual oaths; each of them swears regarding half of the wall that it belongs to him, and it is placed between them in halves, because each of them has possession of half the wall, given that the wall is in their joint possession. If each of them swears regarding the entire wall that it is his and not his companion's, it is permitted, and it is between them. This is the opinion of Abu Hanifa, al-Shafi'i, Abu Thawr, and Ibn