Seadet-i Ebediyye - Endless Bliss Fifth Fascicle

may be a shareholder. It is obligatory to write the word mufâwada
and a list of all the conditions in the regulation of the company. It
is not obligatory to submit the monetary worths of the shares to
the company or to mix them together.
Companies of mufâwada (unlimited parnerships), those of ’inân
(special [limited] partnerships), and those of mudâraba (silent,
sleeping, or dormant, partnerships) are established with gold and/or
silver coins, or with gold or silver articles at places where these
articles are acceptable as currency, or, [according to Imâm
Muhammad,] with any kind of currency, [such as paper lira bills,] or
it can be established after mixing together equal shares of property
made up of items measured by weight or by capacity or by number.
When any part of the property (of the company) is sold, the money
received and the profit earned will belong to the shareholders in
equal amounts. Europeans adopted the ‘company of mufâwada’
from Muslims, and called it ‘unlimited liability company’.
B) Company of ’inân (special, or limited, partnership): It is a
company where shareholders are wakîls (deputies), but not kafîls
(sureties) for one another. It may be stipulated as a self-standing
condition that they will also stand sureties for one another.
Equality of the shares of capital is not an essential condition. The
company will be fâsid if it is not stated how the profit will be
shared. The company will carry on one or various kinds of trade.
The rate of profits will be determined not by the rate of shares but
by the contract. If some of the shareholders work for the company,
they will be paid additionally for their work. If it is stipulated as a
condition that all or some of the shareholders will work for the
company: “It is permissible to pay more profit to some of them
although their shares and work may be equal, or to the ones who
work, when some of them work, or to divide the profit on equal
terms, when the ones with smaller shares work. It is not
permissible to stipulate that the share holders with greater shares
should work, and the profit will be divided in proportion to the
shares. It is not permissible to pay more profit, so as to adjust the
rate of profit to that of shares, to the shareholders who do not
work for the company or who contribute little to the work.” To
undertake something that involves time consumption, such as the
customer services, means to contribute to the work. Therefore, a
shopowner or a masterworkman will be given a share from the
wage given to his assistant.
If it has not been stipulated that the shareholders should work
in the company, their work will be of their own volition. (In that
– 483 –