Explanation: And 'Umar wrote to his governor regarding the hudud (fixed punishments), and 'Umar ibn 'Abd al-'Aziz wrote regarding the age of the one whose tooth was broken, and Ibrahim said: A letter from a judge to a judge is permissible if he knows the letter.

The Shaykh : And 'Umar wrote to his governor regarding the hudud (fixed punishments), and this resembles a letter from a judge to a judge. And 'Umar ibn 'Abd al-'Aziz wrote regarding the age of the one whose tooth was broken, and this is qisas (retaliation in kind). And Ibrahim said: A letter from a judge to a judge is permissible absolutely. Ibrahim, if he speaks absolutely, is al-Nakha'i, and he is from the Tabi'un (the generation after the Companions). He is closer to fiqh (Islamic jurisprudence) than to hadith, and for this reason he is considered among the fuqaha (jurists) and not among the muhaddithin (scholars of hadith). He is a faqih (jurist), but he is weak in hadith. "Weak" here means he does not have the knowledge of the men of hadith, but may Allah have mercy on him, he was strong in fiqh. However, he conditioned it on knowing the letter and the seal. This points to the way of establishing the letter; the establishment of the letter from one judge to another must be that he knows the letter and knows the seal, the seal with which it is sealed. And al-Sha'bi used to permit a sealed letter from a judge, meaning he would accept it from the judge. So if the judge writes the letter and seals it and sends it to the other judge, it is permissible. And it is narrated from Ibn 'Umar something similar to this. And Mu'awiyah ibn 'Abd al-Karim al-Thaqafi said: I witnessed 'Abd al-Malik ibn Ya'la, the judge of Basrah, and Iyad ibn Mu'awiyah, and al-Hasan, and Thumamah ibn 'Abd Allah ibn Anas, and Bilal ibn Abi Burdah, and 'Abd Allah ibn Buraydah al-Aslami, and 'Amir ibn 'Ubadah, and 'Ubadah ibn Mansur, accepting letters from judges without the presence of witnesses. This is the correct view. And some scholars said: It is not accepted unless the judge reads the letter to two just men and seals it in their presence, and says: "Take my letter to so-and-so, son of so-and-so." So it is necessary to bring two witnesses who testify, or who read it to them, or who have it read to them, then it is sealed in their presence, and then they carry it to the judge to whom it is addressed. And this is the madhhab (school of jurisprudence). And according to this opinion, the letters issued by judges via the post are not accepted, are they? No, they are not accepted, because they are sent sealed and sent by the hands of unknown people whose justice is not known. And even if their justice is known, they do not send them by their own hands. But the correct view is that if the letter and the seal are known, it is accepted without the presence of witnesses, as al-Bukhari said regarding these people.