What is the ruling when an older person claims a younger person is their son?
General Chapter
Al-Mughni
Book of Manumission
Primary text
If a person claims a child who is significantly younger than them, such that offspring are not typically born to the claimant in relation to the claimed person (e.g., a twenty-year-old claiming a fifteen-year-old as his son), the claim does not result in emancipation (liberation) nor is the lineage established. This is because the statement is demonstrably false, as its falsehood can be immediately verified, thus it cannot establish freedom, similar to someone claiming a child is their father or a young girl is their mother.
Supporting text
Abu Hanifa ruled that emancipation is established in such a case. Abu al-Khattab derived this opinion as one possible view because the speaker is confessing to something that necessitates freedom, analogous to confessing to freedom itself. Ibn al-Mundhir considered Abu Hanifa's opinion aberrant, unique, contrary to consensus, and a certain falsehood, stating that if this were permissible, it would allow a man to claim a child as his father.