Blood Money Between Consultation and Official Decrees

Dr Osman Abu Zeid
Judge Hussein Sayed Ahmed al-Mufti recounts the following incident: “A woman once came to Sheikh Musa Aqila, one of the judges during the reign of Caliph Abdullah, and said to him: ‘Judge according to what God and His Messenger have said.’ He replied: ‘I judge according to consultation and official decrees.’” (The Development of the Judicial System in Sudan, p. 133). The term al-manshura refers to the proclamations and decrees issued by Imam al-Mahdi and Caliph Abdullah.
A few days ago, social media discussed the amount of diyah (blood money) in Sudan, which has reached 330,000 Sudanese pounds — an extremely meagre sum, worth less than the price of a sheep!
It is undoubtedly a striking paradox. This situation resulted from an amendment introduced by the Minister of Justice during the government of Abdullah Hamdok, which set the blood money amount in law. The amount was set at this figure, which was appropriate when the legal amendment was issued.
However, due to inflation and the erosion of the Sudanese pound’s value, the blood money amount has dwindled to this paltry sum.
A few days ago, the Minister of Justice announced the issuance of a temporary decree amending Article 42 of the Criminal Act of 1991 and restoring the previous practice: setting blood money at one hundred camels, or their cash equivalent, with the amount to be determined by the Chief Justice in consultation with the relevant authorities.
This is the ruling prescribed by Islamic law, as stated in the Prophetic hadith: “For the life of a believing person, one hundred camels [are due].”
Remarkably, this religious ruling, which the Minister of Justice under Hamdok’s government departed from, was observed even during the colonial period. Admittedly, the colonial authorities regarded it as a tribal custom and a form of compensation that could be accepted when necessity demanded it.
A related account can be found in Sheikh Hamad al-Jasir’s book From the Incidents of My Memories (Min Sawāniḥ al-Dhikrayāt).
Hamad al-Jasir recounts that, while serving as a judge in Duba, in northern Saudi Arabia, two groups of Bedouins brought a murder case before him. He ruled that the blood money should be one hundred camels. At the time, a camel was worth sixty riyals.
Al-Jasir describes the outcome as “the case that proved decisive”, for an order was later issued removing him from the judiciary because he had contravened the ruler’s directive. The Council of Ministers had stipulated a fixed amount of 10,000 riyals to prevent any dispute arising over the valuation.

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