Conditional Sales and Other Types of Loans in Qajar Iran

This article examines various aspects of conditional sales ( bayʿ- i sharṭ ) and other types of loans in Qajar Iran (1796-1925). Islamic law prohibited usury, but Shiʿi jurists found a way to legalize money lending at interest. In this paper, I explore how these transactions occurred in practice and what features they had. To this end, I consider three groups of bayʿ- i sharṭ deeds from the National Archives of Iran, discussing how each case proceeded and how differences between cases reveal the ways in which this type of transaction functioned. While similar types of transactions were allowed in other regions and schools of law, the details of Shiʿi legal devices were distinctive.


Introduction
Today, it is a consensus among Muslims that Islam prohibits usury. Modern Islamic banks always try to avoid loans with interest. The Qurʾān explicitly prohibits ribā (Qurʾān II 275 and III 130) and this term, ribā, has been interpreted as usury.1 However, as Maxime Rodinson showed in his famous book Islam et 616 Kondo JESHO 64 (2021)   capitalisme, there have historically been a number of ways to lend money at interest under the rule of Islamic law.2 This was also the case in Qajar Iran. Bayʿ-i sharṭ, which literally means "a sale with stipulation" or "conditional sale," was one such means in Shiʿi law. This mechanism was almost exactly the same as the bayʿ-i jāʾiz in Hanafi law, which was developed so as not to violate Shariʿa's prohibition of ribā. In previous work, I have discussed the conditional sale based on the court records of Sayyid Muḥammad Ṣādiq Sangilajī and Shaykh Fażl Allāh Nūrī, who were leading mujtahids or legal experts in Tehran in the second half of the nineteenth century.3 Having acquired statistical information about this type of transactions, it is now possible to analyze its use and popularity at the shariʿa court in Qajar Tehran from 1860s to 1880s. The bayʿ-i sharṭ was the second or third most common transaction and comprised 12 to 18 percent of the records in each register.4 This fact indicates that the bayʿ-i sharṭ was not only wide-spread at the court but also indispensable for commercial life in Qajar Tehran. However, legality of the bayʿ-i sharṭ was sometimes challenged as Nāṣir al-Dīn Shah (r. 1848-96) once prohibited the foreclosure of conditional sales' security for this reason, which historian considered it as one of the shah's achievements.5 In this paper, I attempt to explore how Islamic law was applied in the Qajar period without obstructing economic life. To this end, I examine three groups of original bayʿ-i sharṭ documents from Qajar Tehran that are preserved in the National Archives of Iran, and attempt to reconstruct the transactions that are related in these materials.
As I examined previously, shariʿa court records, i.e. collections of summaries of shariʿa documents recorded in a court, provided information on each transaction occurred in the court but each record concerns a single transaction and does not indicate any other transactions related to them, which could occur in another court. Also, the court records sometimes refer to the foreclosure of a mortgage of bayʿ-i sharṭ transactions but, even in those cases, the records do not always provide information of the original bayʿ-i sharṭ transactions.6 However, the three sets of original bayʿ-i sharṭ documents, which will be examined here, will reveal what happened in a series of transactions from the beginning to the end in a certain period of time. At the end of paper, I provide Kondo JESHO 64 (2021) 615-639 Although conditional sale was a type of sale contract, it provided money lending at interest with security. The borrower of the money (=seller in conditional sale) could use one's property (=mortgage) even in the loan period. This system was well-prepared for avoiding ribā in Islamic law. Similar transactions took place in other regions, although the legal measures for legitimizing the transactions were different. An earlier example is found in one document dated 1103 from Geniza. A Muslim sold half of his house to two Jews with the right to buy it back ten years after. The Jews also permitted the Muslim to live the house by paying rent at a rate that produced five percent annual interest.9 Given that Geniza documents were composed in Judeo-Arabic, this kind of transaction evidently was not confined to Persianate societies.
In the Ottoman Empire, including the Arab regions, where Hanafi jurisprudence predominated, such transactions were named as bayʿ bil-istighlāl (sale with mortgage) or bayʿ bi'l-wafā (sale with the right of redemption).10 In Central Asia, another Hanafi region, the transactions were known as bayʿ-i jāʾiz (literally, "permitted sale"). Ken'ichi Isogai has examined in detail the forms of bayʿ-i jāʾiz deeds written in Turkic from 19th-century Khiva. According to him, bayʿ-i jāʾiz documents did not include any conditions (sharṭ) for redeeming the property because Hanafi law does not permit conditions because they could harm the main contract of sale. Instead, bayʿ-i jāʾiz documents included a promise (waʿda) to return the property to the seller if the seller repaid the price.11 In another Hanafi region, Mughal India, bayʿ al-wafā was an instrument for ribā.12 The text of one such Persian document published by J.S. Grewal selfnominates as a bayʿ al-wafā, but the point of this document is to have one-year term for repayment, which is distinct from girwī-nāmas (mortgage deeds), the transactions which did not have a time period.13 It was natural for Hanafis not to use khiyār for the transactions, given that, as noted above, Hanafis permitted only three days for khiyār In the case of Iran, the seller leased the property from the buyer until the seller repaid the price, and rent meant de-facto interest. In Hadramaut, a Shafiʿi and Arabic-language region, the transaction was known as bayʿ al-ʿuhda. In this case, the main transaction did not concern property ownership but instead temporary custodianship and use of the property. However, in some cases, rental agreements were concluded separately for an ʿuhda property, which meant a de-facto loan with interest.14 On the other hand, Oman and Zanzibar, where the Ibadi jurisprudence prevails, also had abundant examples of the loans made through use of the khiyār, which were notarized in Arabic.15 The bayʿ-i sharṭ was thus the Shiʿite version of the phenomenon, widely attested not only in Persianate societies but throughout the entire Islamic world, of securitized loan at interest. Although most widely attested in the Qajar period, the bayʿ-i sharṭ is known to have existed in earlier times: a bayʿ-i sharṭ deed from Astarabad is dated 1119 AH (1708),16 and a collection of document The compositional form of bayʿ-i sharṭ deeds reflected their legal definition.
Constituting it did in Islamic law a form of bayʿ (sale), the bayʿ-i sharṭ was notarized in a fashion similar to a standard sale deed.18 The main legal formula in a bayʿ-i sharṭ deed was the statement bifurūkht bi-mubāyaʿa-i khiyāriyya-i sharṭiyya, which could be translated as "he has sold through the mubāyaʿa with the condition of option." This is of course similar to the main formula in a conventional sale deed, namely bifurūkht bi-mubāyaʿa-i lāzima-i jāzima ("he has sold through binding and obliging mubāyaʿa"). Usually, the seller's name came before the main formula, though the order occasionally varied to show respect.19 After the main formula and the names of both parties, the property details were described, and were then followed by the price details, which determined the coins to be paid. In all these details, aside from the wording of the main legal formula, the form of the first part of the bayʿ-i sharṭ deed was exactly the same as conventional sale deeds.
The second legal formula sharṭ-i sharʿī shud ("the legal condition is fixed"), appeared after the price was fixed, which set the terms for the recovery of the merchandise after repayment. This formula was then followed by the stipulation of a mutually-agreed fixed period (muddat-i khiyār), such as "within the six days after six months passed." If the seller repaid the price to the buyer or the buyer's representative during said fixed period, the seller repossessed the property. On the other hand, if the seller could not repay the price, the transaction was irrevocable, and the seller lost the property completely.
The third legal formula ijāra-i sharʿī shud ("the legal lease has occurred") stated that the buyer would lease back the property to the seller for the same period. After this, the rent details were described with the name and weight of coins to be paid. This lease allowed the seller (borrower) not to hand over the property to the buyer (lender) and enabled the seller (borrower) to keep the property during the fixed period. There were some variations in the legal formulas. In Qajar Iran, the contract of settlement (ṣulḥ) could function as the contract of sale or lease. For this reason, the first and third formulas could be substituted with the ṣulḥ contract. When one used the sulḥ contract, the main formula was maṣālaḥa-i khiyāriyya-i sharṭiyya shud ("the settlement with the condition of option has occurred"). Also, the third formula could be changed in the ṣulḥ contract, as one can see in Document 1.20 The bayʿ-i sharṭ deeds bore the endorsements and the seals of the ulama in the upper part of the documents in the same way that conventional sale deeds had. This indicates that they were drafted at a Shariʿa court. A careful examination of these documents reveals no illegal elements in the form of deeds, as they were constructed very carefully.

Description and Analysis of bayʿ-i sharṭ Documents
Like other shariʿa court documents, original bayʿ-i sharṭ deeds were kept by those who had the right over the related property. Today Iranian archives is collecting such documents. Three group of documents that I examine here were preserved in the khazāna collection of National Archives of Iran.21 The name of khazāna might indicate the collection was brought from the Qajar royal treasury, but it contains private deeds, too.

Transactions between Mullā Ibrāhīm and ʿAżud al-Dawla22
The first document concerns the transactions between Mullā Ibrāhīm, a Jew from Isfahan, and Sulṭān Aḥmad Mīrzā ʿAżud al-Dawla, the forty-eighth son 20 "Muṣālaḥa-i sharʿiyya qabūl namūd manāfaʿa-i mabīʿ mazbūr rā (He accepted to receive the profit from the above mentioned property by the ṣulḥ contract)." This is the muṣālaḥa version of qabūl-i ijāra contract. In this case, the subject of the sentence is the lessee, not the lessor. 21 The archives was renamed as the National Library and Archives of Iran in 2002. 22 The of Fatḥ ʿAlī Shah, and the author of a famous court memoir, Tārīkh-i ʿAżudī.23 The deeds of the seven transactions, dated from 1843 to 1846, appear on both sides of a sheet of paper. Contrary to what one might lazily presume, Mullā Ibrāhīm, who was Jewish, was the seller-borrower. It is difficult to establish any information about his identity or background.24 According to the first transaction dated 7 Ẕīḥijja 1258 AH/9 January 1843, notarized in the center of the right side of the sheet, he sold three shops, a bakery, a goldsmith shop, and a sandal (gīvih) shop, to ʿAżud al-Dawla for 100 tumāns by means of a bayʿ-i sharṭ contract with a six-month term. Moreover, Mullā Ibrāhīm acquired six months' profits of the shop from the shops' new owner, ʿAżud al-Dawla, by paying 12 tumāns and 5000 dīnārs to him. In other words, he borrowed 100 tumāns from ʿAżud al-Dawla for six months at 25 percent per annum. The contract had another clause in the margin of the document: if the transaction contained a fraud, or the property belonged to a third party, Mullā Ibrāhīm and his brother had to pay 200-tumān indemnity to ʿAżud al-Dawla.25 What happened next? The deed of the second transaction, written on the reverse side of the sheet, dated 28 Jumādā II 1259 AH/26 July 26 1843, states: "From the sale contract written on the front of the paper, the seller, the buyer and the owner of the shops have been exempted by each other (az ham guzashtah)." The meaning of this statement is not immediately clear. One might assume it means that Mullā Ibrāhīm repaid the debt-but this seems not to be the case: if he had done so, one would expect to see payment notarized by use of the term "cancel" ( faskh), which does not appear here; therefore, it is reasonable to assume that he did not repay the debt. Instead, this second transaction goes on to say that Mullā Ibrāhīm borrowed 100 tumāns again from Ażud al-Dawla for six months at an interest of 12 tumāns using the same security: the shops. Therefore, we can assume that both parties actually renewed the loan after the end of the first term.
Five more transactions took place between Mullā Ibrāhīm and ʿAżud al-Dawla. The third transaction dated 4 Muḥarram 1260 AH/25 January 1844 was notarized on the reverse side. After the term of the second transaction had passed, both parties closed another similar contract. The security was the same shops as in the previous contracts. The loan amount was 112 tumāns, which was equal to the sum of the loan and the interest in the second transaction. The option period was the six days after five months passed, the interest was only 100 dīnārs, which means 0.02 percent per annum. In other words, ʿAżud al-Dawla granted grace to Mullā Ibrāhīm for the second transaction with low interest. The fourth transaction dated 27 Rajab 1260 AH/12 August 1844 is notarized in the margin of the right side. More than one month after the third transaction had passed, both parties closed another contract. The loan amount returned to the original 100 tumāns. The option period was the ten days after five months and four days passed, and the interest was 12 tumāns, which meant 28.1 percent per annum.
The fifth transaction dated 4 Ṣafar 1261 AH/12 February 1845 was inscribed on the reverse side. Both parties closed another contract more than six months after the previous contract. The loan amount was the same 100 tumāns and the interest cost the same 12 tumāns. The option period was the six days after five months passed, which meant that the annual interest rate was 28.8 percent.
The sixth transaction dated 15 Shaʿbān 1261 AH/19 August 1845 was on the reverse side. The next contract ended more than six months after the previous contract. The amounts of the loan and interest, 100 tumāns and 12 tumāns, respectively, did not change. The option period was the six days after six months passed, which meant the interest rate was 24 percent per annum.
The seventh transaction dated 25 Rabīʿ I 1262 AH/23 March 1846 was on the reverse side. The last contract was closed more than seven months after the previous contract. Again, the loan amounts and interest did not change; 100 tumāns and 12 tumāns, respectively. The option period was the three days after three months passed, which meant the annual interest rate was 48 percent.
In all six transactions, the 100-tumān loan and 12 tumāns of payable interest were fixed. The only apparent exception was the third transaction, but one can interpret that the 12 tumāns of interest was added to the original 100-tumān loan in this case. If we calculate the total loans, Mullā Ibrāhīm borrowed 100 tumāns from ʿAżud al-Dawla for three and a half years at the annual rate of 3.4 percent. This is quite a low rate, but we do not have any information about why it should have been so low. We will see a very different situation in the next two cases.

Transaction between Iskandar Mīrzā, Ustād Asad Allāh and Others
Iskandar Mīrzā also belonged to the Qajar family, being the second son of Muḥammad Qulī Mirzā, the second son of Fatḥ ʿAlī Shah. He was the vicegovernor of the Mazandaran province during Fatḥ ʿAlī Shah's reign, but Kondo JESHO 64 (2021) 615-639 appeared to lose his government position during Muḥammad Shah's period.26 Unlike ʿAżud al-Dawla, he was the seller-borrower, and Ustād Asad Allāh, a builder (bannāʾ) from Tehran, was the buyer-lender.
The documents related to this transaction are included in three files. Three bayʿ-i sharṭ transactions took place between Iskandar Mīrzā and Ustād Asad Allāh from 1837 to 1839. The first document dated 14 Rajab 1251 AH/ 5 November 1835 concerns the purchase of a house by Iskandar Mīrzā from the three daughters of a certain Mīrzā ʿAlī Shīrāzī.27 This house, located in the Sangilaj district of Tehran, became the security for the later bayʿ-i sharṭ transactions. The second document, dated 29 Ẕīḥijja 1252 AH/6 April 1837, records a further bayʿ-i sharṭ transaction.28 Iskandar Mīrzā borrowed 180 tumāns from Ustād Asad Allāh for five months with an interest repayment of 21 tumāns and 6000 dīnārs, which meant 28.8 percent per annum. The security was the house Iskandar bought through the first document. The third document, dated 5 Shaʿbān 1253 AH/ 4 November 1837, was drafted on the reverse side of the second document. The document states that Iskandar Mīrzā did not clear the debt in seven months; therefore, the ownership of the house passed to Asad Allāh. As a result, Iskandar bought the house back from Asad Allāh at 200 tumāns, which was more than Iskandar's original debt but less than his total debt including interest. Moreover, Iskandar again borrowed 200 tumāns on the security of the same house and other items, such as shawls and small carpets. The interest was 25 tumāns for six months, which meant 25 percent per annum.
Since Iskandar first paid 200 tumāns and then borrowed the same amount, it is natural to suppose that both sides paid no money. In other words, this transaction was a kind of renewal of the contract, which is rather complicated because it transpired after the expiration of the previous agreement. Another point is that five tumāns out of the total payable interest of 25 tumāns went to the jurist, Mullā Muḥammad Ḥusayn Khurāsānī, who endorsed the document as "compensation for unjust transaction" (radd-i maẓālim). This means that the jurist expected a future legal conflict and he would deal with it if it happened. The transaction contained a legal problem due to its complexity.
The fourth document, a deed of bayʿ-i sharṭ, was dated 2 Rabīʿ I 1255 AH/16 May 1839, more than one year after the previous term of contract 26 Mīrzā The National Archives of Iran no. 296004631. 28 The National Archives of Iran no. 296004630.
terminated.29 The deed did not mention the two previous transactions but the security was the same house. The difference was that three shops were added to the security for the loan, which Iskandar Mīrzā built adjacent to the house. The loan amount was 350 tumāns, the interest cost 22 tumāns, and the option period was the three days after three months passed, which means the interest rate was 25.1 percent per annum. It is probable that Iskandar Mīrzā had not repaid the second loan and was able to renew the contract by adding the shops to the security. Although the loan amount in the deed increased to 350 tumāns, it is unclear how much money Iskandar actually received from Asad Allāh this time. Since the previous loan was 200 tumāns at 25 percent interest per annum, Iskandar's debt should have been more than 275 tumāns after one year and seven months. Therefore, the balance between the amount of debt and the newly added security might have been determined the loan amount. The fifth document, a deed of settlement, was dated 2 Rabīʿ I 1257 AH/ 24 April 24 1841.30 Two years after the previous transaction, Ustād Asad Allāh legally owned the house and the shops because Iskandar Mīrzā could not clear his debt. The condition of the settlement was as follows: Asad Allāh paid 100 tumāns to Iskandar Mīrzā, and Iskandar Mīrzā yielded all of his rights on the house and shops, such as rent from the tenants.
Here we see what could happen if the borrower could not clear their debt within the time period stipulated in the bayʿ-i sharṭ contract. According to this document, there was no doubt about the fact the lender could seize the security. However, here Iskandar Mīrzā acquired more than 100 tumāns. A buyer-lender could acquire a mortgaged house, but they could not do it prior to negotiations with the seller-borrower. According to our calculations, at that time the house and shops were worth 472 tumāns by the fourth and fifth documents. According to the first document, the house cost 240 tumāns; therefore, the value of the house including shops almost doubled.
The sixth document, a deed of bayʿ-i sharṭ, was dated 7 Rabīʿ I 1259 AH/ 7 April 1843.31 Two years after the above-mentioned settlement, Sulṭān Aḥmad Mīrzā Ażud al-Dawla owned the house, though we do not have any document about how he had acquired it. According to this deed, Ażud al-Dawla borrowed 500 tumāns from a certain Āqā ʿAbd al-Ḥamīd for three months with the interest of 37 tumāns, which means 29.6 percent per annum. A two-thirds share of the house was security for this transaction, which did not contain the shops built by Iskandar Mīrzā; Ustād Asad Allāh owned these shops. Contrary

29
The National Archives of Iran no. 296004630. 30 The National Archives of Iran no. 296004630. 31 The National Archives of Iran no. 296004652.

Kondo
JESHO 64 (2021) 615-639 to the transaction with Mullā Ibrāhīm, here we see Ażud al-Dawla as a sellerborrower, not as a buyer-lender. We do not have any information about the result of the transaction, but it is clear that the house was worth 750 tumāns in total, excluding the shops. The seventh document is a sale deed dated 24 Jomādā II 1259 AH/22 June 1843.32 According to this deed, ʿAżud al-Dawla purchased the three shops from Ustād Asad Allāh at the price of 100 tumāns. The house changed owners three times in eight years, and it was mortgaged by two different people. The price of the house rose more than three times from 240 tumāns to 750 tumāns. This case indicates the fluidity of real estate in Qajar Tehran, and one factor was no doubt the bayʿ-i sharṭ transactions.

Transactions between Naẓar ʿAlī Khān and Sulṭān Aḥmad Mīrzā ʿAżud al-Dawla33
Naẓar ʿAli Khān belonged to the Bayāt tribe from Zarand, a small town located 100 km south-west of Tehran. He had a house in Bazar district of Tehran that was mortgaged in transactions between 1844 and 1847.
The first transaction was a deed of bayʿ-i sharṭ dated 26 Ṣafar 1260 AH/ 17 March 1844 inscribed in the right side of the first document. The deed is not original but an authentic copy (savād). Naẓar ʿAlī Khān borrowed 160 tumāns from ʿAżud al-Dawla at the interest of 28 tumāns using the house and ten millstones as security. Here the interest was called bāqī al-ẕimma, the remnants of debt. It is possible that Nażar ʿAlī actually owed ʿAżud al-Dawla some money before this transaction, but in that case the deed needed to have explained the debt in more detail. According to the deed, the borrower had to repay both the original loan and the bāqī al-ẕimma if he wanted to recover the house and millstones. The option period was the seven days after seven months passed, which means the interest rate was 30 percent per annum. The transaction used a ṣulḥ contract with option, i.e., muṣalaḥa-i sharṭiyya, for the loan. However, the borrower could not use the house because the document did not include a lease contract for the house and millstones. Therefore, another sulḥ contract related to the house and the mills was terminated; the borrower rented the house and the stone mills at 100 dīnārs.
The transaction included another clause in the margin. If the borrower did not repay the debt at the fixed time and still did not deliver the security to the lender, the borrower had to pay 5 tumāns per month to the lender. As we see above, lenders sometimes found it difficult to seize the loan security after the loan period had passed. This clause addressed this problem. 32 The National Archives of Iran no. 296004652. 33 The National Archives of Iran no. 296003210. The second transaction was a deed of bayʿ-i sharṭ dated 28 Shavvāl 1260 AH/ 10 November 1844 notarized on the reverse side of Document 1. Eight months after the previous transaction, Naẓar ʿAlī Khān and ʿAżud al-Dawla exempted each other (az ham guẕashta) and revised the contract like the prince and Mullā Ibrāhīm did. However, in this case, Naẓar ʿAlī's loan rose from 160 to 180 tumāns, and the interest (called bāqī al-ẕimma) also rose from 28 to 40.5 tumāns. The security was the same house and stone mills. The option period was the eight days after eight months passed, which means that the interest rate was 33.75 percent per annum. The transaction also contained a clause delaying the security's transfer in the case of non-repayment.
The third transaction was a deed of bayʿ-i sharṭ dated 29 Shaʿbān 1261 AH/ 2 September 1845 written on the reverse side of Document 1. Naẓar ʿAlī Khān and ʿAżud al-Dawla revised the contract again after nine months and the form of the transaction was the same as the previous one. The loan amount was the same 180 tumāns, but the interest (bāqī al-ẕimma) had decreased to 37 tumāns. The security was the same house and stone mills. The option period was the six days after four months passed, which means the interest rate was 61.67 percent per annum.
The fourth transaction was a deed of bayʿ-i sharṭ dated 1 Rabīʿ I 1262 AH/ 27 February 1846 written also in the reverse side of Document 1. Six months after the previous transaction, they again revised the contract. The loan amount was the same 180 tumāns and the interest was 36 tumāns. The security was the same house and stone mills. The option period was the eight days after eight months passed from 1 Muḥarram 1264 AH/30 December 1845, probably because they did not want a vacant period following the termination of the previous transaction. The interest rate was 30 percent per annum.
There is additionally a marginal note dated 23 Ẕīqaʿda 1263 AH/ 2 November 1847, indicating that the loan was unpaid, and the security was seized by the lender. However, there were some other documents drawn up prior to this note.
The fifth transaction, a deed of bayʿ-i sharṭ dated 3 Ṣafar 1263 AH/January 21, 1847, was notarized on a separate piece of paper (Document 2). Eleven months after the previous transaction, they closed another contract. Naẓar ʿAlī Khān borrowed 200 tumāns from ʿAżud al-Dawla with the security of the same house and six stone mills (not the 10 millstones in the previous transactions). The interest was 48 tumāns and the option period was the ten days after 11 months passed from the first of the next month. Therefore, the interest rate was 26.18 percent per annum.
There is a question about the relationship between this deed and the previous deeds. This deed did not mention any previous transactions. However, according to the marginal note of the previous deed, Naẓar ʿAlī Khān did not Kondo JESHO 64 (2021)   repay his debt until Ẕīqaʿda of the same year. Although more than three months had passed since the end of the previous contract, this deed can be understood as a revised version of their previous transactions.
This document also includes a marginal note dated 1 Rabīʿ II 1264 AH/ 7 March 1848 by Mīrzā Abū al-Qāsim Imām Jumʿa, saying "Since two months passed without repayment after the end of the period for option, the transaction was confirmed and the security was seized by Sulṭān Aḥmad Mīrzā." In other words, Naẓar ʿAlī Khān could not clear this debt. The following documents describe the details of the situation.
The sixth transaction was a deed of settlement between ʿAẓud al-Dawla and Mahdī Khān, Naẓar ʿAlī's brother, dated 5 Jumādā I 1263 AH/19 April 1847 and notarized on another piece of paper (Document 3). Since Naẓar ʿAlī Khān had passed away by this point, his brother agreed to pay the debt to ʿAẓud al-Dawla. The security was the same house and six millstones. Mahdī Khān would pay 110 tumāns three months after the contract and an additional 122 tumāns nine months after the contract. If Mahdī Khān did not repay within the due period, ʿAẓud al-Dawla had the right to cancel the transaction, and in that case, the previous deed of bayʿ-i sharṭ would be effective. Here, ʿAẓud al-Dawla tried to collect the debt from Mahdī Khān after Naẓar ʿAlī's death.
An undated administrative document reveals the aftermath of the transactions. It was addressed to Tīmūr Pāshā Mākūʾī, who was a member of military personnel close to the grand wazir, Hājjī Mīrzā Āqāsī. The issuer does not appear in the document, but he was probably the grand wazir because the document started "dear brother." The document explained that Mahdī Khān escaped from Tehran without any payment. For this reason, Mullā Walī Allāh, the representative of ʿAżud al-Dawla, petitioned the Royal divānkhānih. The issuer sent two officials to arrest Mahdī Khān. Tīmūr Pāshā was asked to send Mahdī Khān to Tehran to deal with the debts.
The seventh transaction was a deed of settlement between ʿAżud al-Dawla and heirs of Mahdī Khān, dated 27 Shaʿbān 1264 AH/29 July 1848, and notarized on yet another separate piece of paper (Document 4). The deed stated that Mahdī Khān had passed away without repayment and the house now belonged to ʿAżud al-Dawla. However, Mahdī's brother Hādī Khān, his two sisters and mother claimed that they owned one-tenth of the house. Both parties asked a specialist to estimate the value of the house. Finally, ʿAżud al-Dawla paid 60 tumāns to Hādī Khān and his family acquired full ownership of the house.
Here we know two things. First, although the transactions between ʿAżud al-Dawla and Mahdī Khān appear to have been no problem legally, nevertheless ʿAżud al-Dawla needed to pay 60 tumāns to his heirs. Evidently, relatives could 629 Conditional Sales and Other Types of Loans in Qajar Iran JESHO 64 (2021) 615-639 easily challenge the transaction of bayʿ-i sharṭ. Secondly, since one-tenth of the house was worth 60 tumāns, the total value of the house should have been 600 tumāns. Since ʿAżud al-Dawla paid first 160 tumāns and then 60 tumāns, he acquired a house of more than twice the value of his investment.
A statement by Ibrāhīm Khān b. Muṣṭafā Khān Afshār dated Rajab 1268 AH/ April-May 1852 was the last document related to the house (Document 5). The document states that Ibrāhīm Khān purchased the former house of Naẓar ʿAlī Khān from ʿAẓud al-Dawla and received the related documents from the prince. However, ʿAẓud al-Dawla still owned a piece of land adjacent to the house on the east side, and he did not have any documents proving his ownership over the land. The document was prepared to prove Aẓud al-Dawla's ownership, and Aẓud al-Dawla finally sold the house to Ibrāhīm Khān three years after the previous transaction.

4
Contextualizing the bayʿ-i sharṭ All three cases examined here contained six or more transactions with complex elements. Although the legal framework of the bayʿ-i sharṭ was common to all these cases, there were many differences in detail. For example, the transactions with Mullā Ibrāhīm were quite friendly to the debtor: the loan amount and interest did not change throughout the transactions. However, in the other two cases, the debts increased considerably due to the high interest rate over the course of time, and finally the debtor lost their property to the lender. Even the term used for the interest differed. Interest was usually called māl al-ijāra or māl al-muṣālaḥa, but the transactions with Naẓar ʿAlī Khān used the term bāqī al-ẕimma. Only Iskandar Mīrzā's third document stipulated the radd-i maẓālim. The transactions with Naẓar Khān prepared for the delay of repayment with a special clause. These facts indicate that the borrower and the lender needed to negotiate every detail of the transactions.
We can compare these documents with those in the sharīʿa court records. The court records are registers of issued documents at sharīʿa courts. The form of the records varies by the registers. For example, Shaykh Fażl Allāh's register is simple for bayʿ-i sharṭ records as follows: In this case, Sayyid Ibrāhīm borrowed 100 tumāns with 20 tumāns for one year. It is clear that these documents contain every detail of each transaction that the shariʿa court records omitted. On the other hand, the shariʿa court records provide statistical information.
The court records from nineteenth century Tehran contained 832 bayʿ-i sharṭ contracts with a lease (i.e., security and interest). Most transactions cost less than 400 tumāns, and the interest rates were usually between 10 and 30 percent per annum. The normal loan period was less than two years. Also, there are 75 records of foreclosure and 37 records of repayment in the court registers.35 Most transactions described above were in the normal range found in the shariʿa court records.
Conditional sales were prevalent not only in cities but also in rural areas. The collection of Az Astārā tā Istarabād documents included 15 such deeds from 1708 to 1881. The oldest document, dated 1119 AH/1708, concerns a transaction, which interest was not cash but 1 kharvār and 10 man36 of unhulled rice.37 Most transactions were conducted over less than a year, just like the bayʿ-i sharṭ transactions in Tehran.38 However, two transactions were made for a longer period; nine years and ten years respectively.39 In rural areas, therefore, a longer contract of conditional sale was possible, perhaps because people did not move to other places in as a short period of time as they did in cities.
Returning to the court records from Tehran, one can find two somewhat similar but different types of contracts. The first type was a simple loan with interest. One example from Sangilajī's register was dated 7 Shavvāl 1284 AH/ 1 February 1868.40 The creditor (dāʾin) was Āqā Shaykh Ḥusayn, and the debtor (madyūn) was Mīrzā Buzurg Shaykh al-Islām, both of whom were probably of the 'ulama class. The debt was 310 tumāns, and the loan period was one year. At first glance, the transaction appears normal. However, when we examine the debt details, we find reference to an aṣl of 250 tumāns and a farʿ of 60 tumāns (both rendered in siyāq numerals). There is no clear explanation as to the meaning of aṣl and farʿ, but context suggests that the former term denotes the original debt and the latter the per-annum interest, which means 24 percent interest per year, a normal rate for loans in Qajar Tehran. This type of transaction varied in the registers. For example, a record in Shaykh Fażl Allāh Nurī's register refers to the interest as the vajh-i muṣālaḥa. According to this record, Mīrzā ʿAlī Aṣghar Kujūrī borrowed 100 tumāns from Mīrzā Muḥammad Bāqir Yūzbāshī for one year in 1304 AH/1886. The interest was 24 tumāns, which represented 24 percent interest per annum. In this case, ʿAlī Aṣghar offered a one-sixth share of his house to Muḥammad Bāqir as security for the loan.41 In practice, this transaction was effectively the same as a bayʿ-i sharṭ because it was a loan with security and interest, but the legal device it employed was very different from the bayʿ-i sharṭ.
The difference between a simple loan with interest and a conditional sale might be the former's simplicity and flexibility. A simple loan could be arranged with or without interest, and with or without a pawn (rahn), while a conditional sale could not be made without property for security. According to the shariʿ court records, 70 to 80 percent of simple loans did not include security and interest, while 16 to 17 percent of simple loans included interest but did not include security. Moreover, simple loans with both interest and security, which were similar to conditional sales, constituted less than 6 percent of all simple loans.42 In fact, a simple loan with a pawn was different from a conditional sale, because the pawn would be in the hands of creditors until debtors repaid their debts. Conditional sales were easier because debtors could keep their property in their hands throughout the loan period.
Moreover, one can find another type of transaction, which used the bayʿ-i sharṭ contract without a lease contract. For example, Seller: Mīrzā Khān Beg, major of the royal artillery originally from Hamadan, living in Tehran. Buyer: Āqā Sayyid Naṣr Allāh, merchant from Tabriz. The seller should deliver all of 1 Tabriz kharvār of sheep oil with excellent, perfect, and praised quality to the buyer three months later in Tehran (dār al-khilāfa). The price, 20 tumāns and 2 riyāls43 with Panāh-ābād silver coins with 13 nukhuds44 weight, was received. The option period 41 Ittiḥādiyya and Rūḥī, The buyer paid the price for the sheep oil but could receive the oil later. The seller could recover the oil if he repaid the price within the three days after three months passed. For the seller, the transaction was beneficial because he could borrow the cash quickly. On the other hand, the buyer could receive the sheep oil at what price three months before, which was expected to be cheaper than the current market price. This transaction was called sallam, i.e. a contract for delivery with prepayment in Islamic law.46 The fiqh texts after the ninth century considered it a kind of loan. In such cases, the buyer purchased the goods at a lower price than that in the market. The seller endured a loss at first, but he could regain some of it by using the cash he borrowed. In Qajar Tehran, this transaction was not as popular as the typical conditional sale: 56 cases compared to 832 cases of typical conditional sales in the court records. The buyer's profits only came from the margin of the oil prices, and this transaction might not be as profitable as the typical conditional sales.

Conclusion
Unlike Islamic banking today, Qajar mujtahids allowed loans with interest using conditional sales or simple loans. After analyzing three groups of the bayʿ-i sharṭ documents, one finds that there was a great variety of transactions in terms of not only the type of contract, loan periods, interest rates, and collateral, but also existence or non-existence of the indemnity or the radd-i maẓālim clauses. The documents indicate that most instances of loans at interest could not be resolved with a single transaction. Instead, both parties renewed their contracts several times, although the final results of these transactions i.e. repayment or foreclosure was different according to the case. The varieties of contracts undertaken in urban areas was broad in comparison to that from rural areas. This paper has also revealed that there were two types of transactions resembling the bayʿ-i sharṭ: a simple loan with interest 45 Riżāyī and a contract for delivery with prepayment.47 These were alternative ways for people in Qajar Tehran to borrow money. The variety made loan transactions more complicated. These kinds of transactions required longer negotiations than usual contracts such as simple sales, and the professional help of the Shariʿa court. The prohibition of ribā made the transactions more complex, and the complex transactions may have somehow obstructed the flow of economic transactions. However, these complex transactions would have benefited the 'ulama class who controlled Shariʿa courts. Because they stood to benefit, the presiders of the courts, the mujtahids, permitted these transactions in spite of doubts about their legality.
Although the bayʿ-i sharṭ necessitated complex procedures and negotiations, this transaction was essential for the economy at that time. As mentioned above the Qajar government once prohibited the foreclosure on property of borrowers who could not repay debts by bayʿ-i sharṭ before 1864. However, this prohibition caused borrowers not to repay debts and, consequently, the lenders not to lend money. As a result, the economy was disrupted, and "the gates of transactions were closed." Therefore, in 1864, Nāṣir al-Dīn Shah issued the royal order to permit the foreclosure after a one-year moratorium.48 It appears that this was not so effective, and the government issued the same order again in 1867.49 As Mary Sheil, who stayed in Iran as the wife of British envoy to Iran, Justin Shiel (office, 1844-54), remarked, "The entire nation seems in debt, commencing with the Shah, who is in debt to the Emperor of Russia, and ending with the humblest muleteers."50 Debts were so prevalent in Qajar society that she could not ignore them. The bayʿ-i sharṭ was one of the major measures to borrow money at that time. This form of documentation was indispensable to the flow of economic transactions at the time, and jurists permitted such transactions during the period prior to the establishment of modern banks. In Qajar Iran, legal practice fulfilled two objectives: to observe the principles of Islamic law with the complex procedures and to keep the economy alive. 47 The moneychangers (ṣarrāfs) used promissory notes for lending money but I did not mention here because they were not related to the shariʿa courts. For the details, see Kondo, Rūznāma