Counting of the Beats of Breathing
A man struck the chest of another man who claimed that it had affected the regularity of his breathing. Hazrat Ali (A) decided the case by counting the beats of his breath in the following manner.
According to Hazrat Ali (A), the breath of a person remains for some time in ones right nostril and sometimes in the left. In the early morning till sunrises he said it remains in the right nostril. Therefore he counted the breath of the man in question while it was in the right nostril and then the next morning that of another man supposed to be possessing regularly breathing and then made the man who had struck the complainant pay the latter a penalty therefor according to the difference between normality and irregularity of the latters breathing. (Qaza p. 150)
