Note 8 — Chapter VI

Note 8.—On the Law respecting Murder and unintentional Homicide. The Ḳur-án ordains that murder shall be punished with death; or, rather, that the free shall die for the free, the slave for the slave, and a woman for a woman; or that the perpetrator of the crime shall pay, to the heirs of the person whom he has killed, if they will allow it, a fine, which is to be divided according to the laws of inheritance.346 It also ordains, that unintentional homicide shall be expiated by freeing a believer from slavery, and paying, to the family of the person killed, a fine, unless they remit it.347 But these laws are amplified and explained by the same book and by the Imáms.—A fine is not to be accepted for murder unless the crime has been attended by some palliating circumstance. This fine, the price of blood, is a hundred camels; or a thousand deenárs (about 500l.) from him who possesses gold; or, from him who possesses silver, twelve thousand dirhems348 (about 300l.). This is for killing a free man; for a woman, half that sum; for a slave, his or her value, but that must fall short of the price of blood for the free. A person unable to free a believer must fast two months as in Ramaḍán. The accomplices of a murderer are liable to the punishment of death. By the Sunneh also, a man is obnoxious to capital punishment for the murder of a woman; and by the Ḥanafee law, for the murder of another man's slave. But he is exempted from this punishment who kills his own child or other descendant, or his own slave, or his son's slave, or a slave of whom he is part-owner: so also are his accomplices: and according to Esh-Sháfe'ee, a Muslim, though a slave, is not to be put to death for killing an infidel, though the latter be free. A man who kills another in self-defence, or to defend his property from a robber, is exempt from all punishment. The price of blood is a debt incumbent on the family, tribe, or association, of which the homicide is a member. It is also incumbent on the inhabitants of an enclosed quarter, or the proprietor or proprietors of a field, in which the body of a person killed by an unknown hand is found; unless the person has been found killed in his own house.