Transfer of debt (hawalah): may he go back on it?

Ibrahim said: In every hawalah (transfer of a debt) there can be recourse. However, if a man says to another, "I sell you what is due from so-and-so and so-and-so for such and such," then once he has sold it, he cannot have recourse.

Al-Hakam bin Utaybah said: In a hawalah there is no recourse to the one who made the transfer, until he becomes destitute, or dies and leaves nothing with which to settle it, for a man is sometimes wealthy and sometimes destitute.

Sayyiduna Uthman (may Allah be pleased with him) said regarding hawalah: There can be recourse in a hawalah; a Muslim's wealth is not to be left to perish.

Al-Hasan said: When a person accepts the transfer of his debt onto a wealthy man, and that man later becomes bankrupt, the transfer remains binding on him.

Khattab al-Usfuri said: A man transferred to me wealth deposited with a Jew, and that Jew refused to give me the wealth and kept putting me off. I asked al-Sha'bi about this, and he said: Go back to the first man.

Shurayh said: If a man transfers a creditor onto another man, and that other man delays payment, recourse is to the first man.

The same is reported through another chain.

Al-Sha'bi considered it disliked for a person to say, "I buy from you what is due from so-and-so." Al-Sha'bi said: This is gharar (a dealing in something not present).

Al-Hasan did not consider a hawalah to be a discharge of the debt, except that when the one owed actually discharges him, he is discharged.