The Session Requirement
The Hanafi school (dominant position): offer and acceptance must occur in a single majlis (session, sitting). Once the parties separate without the offer having been accepted, the offer lapses. This reflects the mercantile reality of classical Islamic commerce: contracts were concluded in person, in a definite encounter.
The modern challenge: phone, fax, email, and digital contracting all involve parties who are not physically co-present. The contemporary Hanafi position generally treats electronic communication as constituting a continuous majlis until the communication ends.
Matching Requirements
The acceptance must match the offer in all material terms. If A offers to sell his house for 500,000 dirhams and B says “I accept, for 480,000,” this is not acceptance — it is a counter-offer that the original offer cannot be deemed to accept. The material terms must match exactly.
Implied Acceptance
Can acceptance be implied by conduct? The schools differ:
- Hanafi: conduct can constitute acceptance in certain transaction types (particularly commercial ones where the price and goods are clear)
- Shafi’i: explicit verbal acceptance is required for significant contracts; silence is not acceptance
- Maliki: custom (‘urf) determines what counts as accepted — if the market custom treats a given conduct as acceptance, it functions as such
Writing and Witnesses
A contract concluded verbally in a valid session is binding even without a written record. The Quran (2:282) recommends writing for debt contracts but does not make it a condition of validity. Witnesses are recommended for marriage (and required by some schools) and highly recommended for major transactions.
See also: Fiqh Al Tawkil, Fiqh Al Musharakah, Fiqh Al Ijarah, Fiqh Al Murabaha, Ilm Al Usul