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Herein, Ibn Rushd I (d. 520/1126) reviews the prohibition of cross-confessional testimony. He clarifies that cross-confessional testimony is specifically forbidden between Christian and Jews, due to the historical presence of enmity between the groups, but is generally permissible in other cases such as among Zoroastrians. In Justice and Leadership in Early Islamic Courts, Ahmed El Shamsy surveys Ibn Rushd as a springboard to discussing the admissibility of testimony which might be prohibited on a case-by-case basis if enmity is known to exist.   

This source is part of the Online Companion to the book Justice and Leadership in Early Islamic Courts (ILSP/HUP 2017)—a collection of sources and other material used in and related to the book.  

Following the loss of the last Muslim-controlled territory in Spain in 1491, remaining Muslims came under significant pressure to accept baptism and adopt Christian customs. In response to this situation, a North African mufti, believed to be Abu al-Abbas Ahmad ibn Abi Jum'ah al-Maghrawi al-Wahrani, wrote the Oran Fatwa in 1504. The fatwa lauds Muslims in Spain for continuing to practice their religion in the face of oppression. It also specifies ways in which Muslims may alter the ways they carry out the commands of Islam in order to ensure their survival.

The fifth/eleventh al-Aḥkām al-Kubra, represents a new and unique legal genre for Islamic criminal justice. The treatise serves as an early example of nawāzil literature composed in al-Andalus made up of a combination of reports on legal cases coupled with the opinions and judgements of jurists and magistrates associated with it. These nawāzil also include criminal cases under the jurisdiction of the shurṭa. Ibn Sahl (d. 486/1093), a jurist living in Cordoba under the Jahwarids (r. 422– 461/1031–1069) and author of al-Aḥkām al-Kubra discusses actual crimes cases which occurred in Cordoba, and portrays the shurṭa working with jurists to arrive at a judgment. This detailed portrayal of jurists being involved in the realities of criminal justice is a distinctive element of this text. The case presented in this text is a murder of a man, allegedly perpetrated by his family, and the complex social-legal challenges of prosecuting such a case. 

The source is edited by Yaḥya Murād in Abū al-Aṣbagh ʿĪsā b. Sahl, Kitab al-Nawāzil al-aʻlām al-musamma Dīwān al-aḥkām al-kubrál. Cairo: Dār al-Hadith, 2007. Scans of this case have been made available.