Islam obliged people to honor their contracts and fulfill the contractual terms and conditions that people agreed upon so long as their condition neither makes that which is lawful forbidden nor that which is forbidden lawful. If such a condition existed in the agreement, then the condition will have no effect and deemed void and null. In this hadeeth, ‘Aaishah, the Mother of the Believers, reports that she wanted to buy Bareerah bint Safwaan (may Allah be pleased with her) who was a slave at that time, so she can manumit her. However, her master – it has been said that her master was ‘Utbah ibn Abee Lahab and others said her masters were from the tribe of Banee Hilaal – insisted that he will be entitled to the right to al-walaa’ after she is manumitted. The walaa’ is a legal term that means kinship by emancipation which refers to cases in which a slave is emancipated by his or her owner, and then a kinship is made between the emancipator and the emancipated, and thus, the ex-master would inherit from his freed slaves if they had no heirs. This relationship establishes a form of permanent kinship between the ex-master and the freed slave so the latter will support his ex-master and be treated as a relative. The Arabs before Islam used to sell and gift this right, but Islam made it forbidden because al-walaa’ is deemed like lineage that cannot be revoked. The Prophet ﷺ explained to ‘Aaishah (may Allah be pleased with her) that she can buy her and that the condition stipulated has no value since it is an invalid condition because al-walaa’ is for the manumitter. Then, ‘Aaishah (may Allah be pleased with her) reported one day her freed slave-girl, Bareerah, received some meat, which was given to her in charity. Then, she gave some of it to the Prophet ﷺ who accepted from her, because while it was given to her in charity, it was given to him as a gift; thus, it was lawful for him eat. This hadeeth indicates that is permissible to give charity to the freed slaves of the wives of the Prophet ﷺ provided the wife is not from the tribes of Haashim or ‘Abdul-Muttalib like Zaynab bint Jahsh (may Allah be pleased with her). This is based on the hadeeth recorded in Sunan Aboo Dawood and Sunan al-Nisaa’iee, which reads: “The charity is not permissible for us, and the freed slave of a people is one of them”. This hadeeth shows that al-Walaa (kinship by emancipation) is for the manumitter, and that it is permissible to give charity to the freed slaves of the wives of the Prophet ﷺ..