Anyone taking up the post of judge must be :

1) Muslim.

2) Free.

3) Mature.

4) Sane.

5) Just (‘adl).

6) Faqih (learned scholar), able to apply the rules to the situations.

7) They must have the faculty of the three main senses - sight, hearing and speech.

For the person who takes up the judiciary of madhaalim, in addition to the conditions mentioned, he must also be male and a mujtahid (legist), just like the supreme judge (Qadi al-Qada‘a), for his post is in fact one of judiciary and of ruling, where he judges the ruler and executes the Shari‘ah upon him. Therefore he must be male in addition to the other conditions for the post of judge .

As well as being faqih he should also be a mujtahid, for part of the madhaalim that he could be required to look into is whether the ruler has ruled by other than what Allah has revealed, i.e. ruled by a law that has no Shari‘ah evidence to back it, or in case the evidence he used does not relate to the event, and only the mujtahid can deal with such madhlama. Therefore if he were not a mujtahid, he would be judging on something he knows little about or has no knowledge of at all, and that is forbidden. Therefore, in addition to the conditions of the ruler and those of the judge, he also should be a mujtahid.