In this matter, the first thing to understand is that giving three divorces together is forbidden. Mahmud bin Labid (may Allah be pleased with him) narrates that the Messenger of Allah ﷺ was informed about a man who had pronounced three divorces to his wife at once. The Prophet ﷺ stood up in a state of anger and said:
أيلعب بكتاب الله، وأنا بين أظهركم ؟
Translation: “Is the Book of Allah being played with while I am still among you?”
And the correct way of divorcing is that the husband divorces his wife once while she is in a state of purity (tuhr); then, if he does not wish to take her back, he divorces her a second time in the next tuhr without approaching her; then, if he does not wish to take her back, he divorces her a third time in the third tuhr without approaching her.
Allah the Exalted has also described this same method in the Holy Qur’an, saying:
ا لطَّلَاقُ مَرَّتَانِ ۖ فَإِمْسَاكٌ بِمَعْرُوفٍ أَوْ تَسْرِيحٌ بِإِحْسَانٍ
“Divorce is twice; then either retain in good manner or release with kindness.”
That is, the divorce after which the husband has the right to take his wife back is two times. So after the first and second divorce, the husband may take her back, whereas after the third divorce he no longer has the right to take her back. The wisdom behind allowing the right of reconciliation is that spouses should not be separated due to a divorce pronounced without thought, but that the husband be given the opportunity to reflect and consider. Otherwise, if the first divorce carried a command of permanent separation, many homes could be destroyed by it. The divine saying الطلاق مرتان points to this very wisdom. In our view, in the matter under discussion as well, this wisdom can only be fulfilled if three divorces pronounced in one sitting are counted as a single divorce, and the husband retains the right to take her back afterward. This is why, during the entire era of the Messenger of Allah ﷺ, then throughout the caliphate of Abu Bakr (may Allah be pleased with him), and in the first two years of the caliphate of Umar (may Allah be pleased with him), according to the narration of Ibn Abbas (may Allah be pleased with him), three divorces were counted as one divorce. Then, when Umar (may Allah be pleased with him) saw that people were showing extreme irresponsibility in the matter of divorce, he enforced three divorces as a punishment.
Now the question arises: why did Umar (may Allah be pleased with him) issue an order to count three divorces pronounced together as three divorces, when this was not the case in the era of the Messenger of Allah, the era of Abu Bakr, and the first two years of his own caliphate? The answer is that as long as people adhered to the lawful method of divorce, Umar (may Allah be pleased with him) continued to decide according to the law prevailing in the time of the Messenger of Allah and Abu Bakr, counting three divorces as one divorce, and whoever pronounced three divorces at once was given lashes.
Because uttering three divorces together was extremely disliked in the Shariah, but when people began doing so frequently, he issued an order to count three divorces as three as a punishment, so that people would refrain from it and show reflection, patience and forbearance in the matter of divorce. Since the reasons for this measure were known to the noble Companions (may Allah be pleased with them), they remained silent about it.
One point deserves attention here: when Umar (may Allah be pleased with him) issued this order, he did not say that it was the command of the Messenger of Allah ﷺ, but rather said فلو أمضينا عليهم, meaning he attributed this order to himself. So it was his own ijtihad, undertaken to curb a particular practice of the people in view of specific circumstances. Later, Umar (may Allah be pleased with him) regretted it and retracted from it.
Is the issue of divorce a matter of consensus (ijma’)?
Hanafi muqallids never tire of claiming that since Umar (may Allah be pleased with him) issued the ruling to count three divorces pronounced together as three, there has been consensus (ijma’) on this ruling, and that no one has disagreed with it except the Ahl al-Hadith. This is a great act of scholarly dishonesty and nothing more than false propaganda, because:
➊ Even in the era of Abu Bakr and during the first two years of Umar’s caliphate, there was consensus that three divorces pronounced together were to be counted as one divorce. What is the status of that consensus? Will that consensus be nullified and rendered unenforceable by a disciplinary ruling issued by Umar (may Allah be pleased with him)?
➋ There is no doubt that the ruling to count three divorces as three was issued by a Rightly Guided Caliph (although it was a disciplinary ruling). But the law to count them as one was also the law of the caliphate of another Rightly Guided Caliph, who was greater than him. Then Umar (may Allah be pleased with him) himself upheld that same law for two years. Likewise, among the Rightly Guided Caliphs, Ali (may Allah be pleased with him) also held the view that three divorces are counted as one. So tell us, what is left of your claim of consensus?
➌ Among the Companions (may Allah be pleased with them), Ibn Mas’ud (may Allah be pleased with him), Abdur Rahman ibn Awf (may Allah be pleased with him) and Zubayr (may Allah be pleased with him) also held that three divorces are counted as one. Then where has your claim of consensus gone?
➍ Among the Tabi’in and the Tabi’ al-Tabi’in (may Allah have mercy on them), Ata (may Allah have mercy on him), Tawus (may Allah have mercy on him), Amr ibn Dinar (may Allah have mercy on him), among others, also counted three divorces pronounced in one sitting as one divorce only.
➎ Scholars of the Ummah, such as Shaykh al-Islam Ibn Taymiyyah, Hafiz Ibn al-Qayyim, Hafiz Ibn Hajar (may Allah have mercy on them all), Imam Qurtubi, Imam Fakhr al-Din al-Razi, and Imam Shawkani, among others, have described this issue as a matter of difference of opinion. So we do not know how it became a matter of consensus.
➏ Abdur Rahman al-Jaziri, the author of the book الفقه على المذاهب الأربعة and a well-known scholar, writes while refuting the claim of consensus:
ولكن الواقع أنه لم يوجد إجماع، فقد خالفهم كثير من المسلمين
“The reality is that (the action of Umar (may Allah be pleased with him)) was never agreed upon, and many Muslims opposed it.”
➐ In India, under the auspices of the Islamic Research Institute, Ahmedabad, a seminar was held in November 1973, in which six Deobandi and two Ahl al-Hadith scholars took part. Seven of them presented papers on the three divorces pronounced in one sitting. With one exception, all of them described this issue as a matter of difference of opinion dating back to the era of the Companions (may Allah be pleased with them), and all of them adopted the position held by the Ahl al-Hadith. The complete proceedings of this seminar and the papers presented in it were later published in a book titled “Three Divorces in One Sitting in the Light of the Quran and Sunnah.”
➑ The well-known Barelvi scholar Pir Karam Shah Azhari wrote a book titled “Da’wat-e-Ghor-o-Fikr” (An Invitation to Reflection), in which he invited the Hanafis to free themselves from the bonds of taqlid and reflect in the light of the Quran and Sunnah. On the issue of the triple divorce, he strongly supported and endorsed the position of the Ahl al-Hadith.
For further details, see: “Sirat-e-Mustaqeem aur Ikhtilaf-e-Ummat” by Shaykh Abu al-Ashbal and Hafiz Salahuddin Yusuf.
On the issue of divorce, who stands with the Shia……… the Ahl al-Hadith or the Hanafi muqallids?
Rangooni Sahib, after citing the statements of some Ahl al-Hadith scholars on the issue of divorce, writes:
“So these are some Ahl al-Hadith who are with the Shia on the issue of divorce.”
According to Rangooni’s statement, the explanation for this is that Ahl-e-Hadith opposed the consensus of the Ummah on this issue, and the Shia also oppose the consensus of the Ummah. However, we have already made clear in the preceding lines that the claim of consensus is a deception: from the Companions, the Tabi’un, and the Tabi’ al-Tabi’in (may Allah be pleased with them), and in every era after them, this issue has remained a matter of difference of opinion, and fair-minded Muqallids have acknowledged this reality. On the contrary, this issue was a matter of consensus only at the time when three divorces were counted as one divorce, that is, in the era of the Messenger of Allah ﷺ, then in the era of Siddiq (may Allah be pleased with him), and then in the first two or three years of the caliphate of Farooq (may Allah be pleased with him). After that, when Hadrat Umar (may Allah be pleased with him) issued a disciplinary ruling, this issue took on the status of a disputed matter. Thus, it is the Muqallids, not the Ahl-e-Hadith, who deny its consensual status. Furthermore, to regard the agreement of the four Imams on a matter as consensus (ijma’) is also a very great error, because it is certain that the truth is not confined to the madhhabs of these four Imams; it may also lie outside them. And if the truth is held to be confined to these four madhhabs, what will you say about those Muslims who existed before these madhhabs came into being, among whom are the Companions and the Tabi’un (may Allah be pleased with them)? Were there no mujtahids among them? If there were, what is the status of their ijtihad? And regarding the Companions and Tabi’un (may Allah be pleased with them) whose position on the issue under discussion differs from the position of the four Imams, what is the ruling about them? Are they also with the Shia?
And if one reflects, in this issue it is not the Ahl-e-Hadith but the Hanafi Muqallids who are with the Shia, because it is the Hanafi Muqallids who, by relying on the issue of divorce, opened the door to a curse like halala, an act which, according to the hadith of the Messenger of Allah ﷺ, is accursed, and the one who does it and the one who gets it done is deserving of the curse. The Hanafi Muqallids declare it permissible, إنالله وإنا إليه راجعون, whereas on the other hand, among the Shia, mut’ah is permissible. The common feature of halala and mut’ah is not hidden from anyone.
The Issue of Divorce and Saudi Scholars
On the issue of “triple divorce,” most Saudi scholars have adopted the position that three divorces pronounced in a single sitting count as one divorce, and after that the husband has the right of raj’ah (revocation). So let us review the fatwas of these scholars:
➊ Shaykh Ibn Baz (may Allah have mercy on him)
A detailed fatwa of the Shaykh is present in فتاوى المرأة المسلمة, whose Urdu translation in “Fatawa Allama Abdul Aziz bin Baz, p. 295” is rendered as follows:
If a person divorces his wife with three divorces in a single sentence, for example by saying: “You are divorced three times,” or “You have been given three divorces,” then the view of the majority of scholars is that all three divorces take effect on the woman and she becomes forbidden to her husband, until she, of her own will (not for the purpose of halala), marries another man, has intercourse with him, and the second husband divorces her or dies, whereupon she becomes lawful for the first husband. The people who hold this view present as evidence that Hadrat Umar (may Allah be pleased with him) enforced exactly this upon the people.
And the view of other people is that it is only one divorce, and while the woman is in her ‘iddah the husband may revoke it, and if she has come out of the ‘iddah he may make her lawful again through a fresh marriage contract. As evidence they present the following narration from Sahih Muslim, where Hadrat Abdullah bin Abbas (may Allah be pleased with him) says: “In the time of the Messenger of Allah ﷺ, in the time of Hadrat Abu Bakr Siddiq (may Allah be pleased with him), and in the first two years of the caliphate of Hadrat Umar Farooq (may Allah be pleased with him), three divorces were one divorce.” Hadrat Umar (may Allah be pleased with him) said: “People have acted hastily in a matter in which they had been given leniency; would that we enforced the three divorces upon them.” So he enforced it. In another narration also in Muslim, Abu Sahba said to Hadrat Abdullah bin Abbas (may Allah be pleased with him): “Were three divorces not counted as one divorce in the era of the Messenger, the era of Siddiq, and the first three years of Farooq’s era?” Hadrat Ibn Abbas (may Allah be pleased with him) replied: “Yes, of course.”
Their second proof is the narration in Musnad Ahmad, whose chain is jayyid (good), in which Abdullah bin Abbas (may Allah be pleased with him) reports that: “Abu Rukanah divorced his wife three times, and he grieved over it, so the Messenger of Allah ﷺ returned his wife to him and said that it is one divorce.”
These people have interpreted this hadith and the previous one as meaning that three divorces were pronounced in a single sentence, so that there is no contradiction between these two hadiths and the verse in which Allah the Exalted said: الطلاق مرتان “Divorce is twice”
and also so that there is no contradiction with the verse: فان طلقها فلا تحل له من بعد حتى تنكح زوجا غيرة “If he divorces her, she is not lawful to him thereafter until she marries another husband”
Abdullah bin Abbas (may Allah be pleased with him), according to a sound report, adopted this view, and in another narration it is also related from him that he adopted the view of the majority. Among those who held that three divorces count as one are Ali, Abdur Rahman bin Awf and Zubair bin al-Awwam (may Allah be pleased with them all).
Muhammad bin Ishaq (author of Kitab al-Maghazi, the first writer on the biography of the Prophet) and a group of the Tabi’un also say this, and a group of earlier and later scholars hold this view. The view of Shaykh al-Islam Ibn Taymiyyah (may Allah have mercy on him) and his student Allama Ibn al-Qayyim (may Allah have mercy on him) is also this, and I too issue this fatwa, because it applies all the evidences, and it also contains the aspect of mercy, compassion and ease towards the Muslims.
➋ The Fatwa Committee of Senior Scholars and Rangooni’s Deception
Rangooni writes: “The Saudi government and the distinguished scholars of Saudi Arabia are unanimous that three divorces pronounced in one sitting are three. The investigative council that the Saudi government has established over the scholars of the Haramain and other well-known scholars of the country, whose decision remains enforced in all the country’s courts, had the issue of triple divorce placed before it, and after examining the clear evidences from the texts of the Qur’an and Hadith, the explanations of the Tafsir and the commentaries of the Hadith, and after discussion and debate, it unanimously decided that three divorces pronounced in one word are three.”
Dear readers, you have seen Rangooni’s statement; now also see the actual reality:
The actual reality is that when this issue was placed before the investigative committee of the senior scholars of Saudi Arabia, and those scholars researched it, most of them indeed adopted the position Rangooni mentioned, but this position was not unanimous. Rather, five senior scholars of that committee differed with this position and wrote a separate decision, the opening words of which are as follows:
الحمد لله والصلاة والسلام على رسوله وآله، وبعد : فنرى أن الطلاق الثلاث بلفظ واحد طلقة واحدة
Translation: “After praise of Allah and blessings and peace: our position is that three divorces pronounced in one word are one divorce.”
And Shaykh Abdullah al-Bassam, revealing this same reality, writes:
وخالف من أعضاء المجلس خمسة وهم : الشيخ عبد العزيز بن باز، والشيخ عبد الرزاق عفيفي، والشيخ عبد الله خياط، والشيخ راشد بن حنين، والشيخ محمد بن جبير
Translation: “Five of the members of the council adopted a separate position, and they are: Shaykh Ibn Baz, Shaykh Abdur Razzaq Afifi, Shaykh Abdullah Khayyat, Shaykh Rashid bin Hunain, Shaykh Muhammad bin Jubair.”
Thus it is established that the claim that the fatwa issued by the investigative committee of the senior scholars of Saudi Arabia, which counted three divorces pronounced in one word as three, was the unanimous decision of those scholars is a lie and scholarly deception, because five senior scholars of that committee issued a decision that three divorces count as one divorce; and then the very words of the fatwa that Rangooni quoted, توصل المجلس بأكثرية, also point to this same reality.
➌ Shaykh Abdullah bin Aqil (may Allah have mercy on him)
He is a Saudi student of the well-known scholar Abdur Rahman bin Nasir al-Sa’di (may Allah have mercy on him). His teacher asked him several questions, one of which concerned “triple divorce”; in answer to it he writes:
وأما سؤالك عن الراجح فى مسألة الطلاق الثلاث لكلمة أو لكلمات فقد تقرر وتكرر أننا نعتقد صحة ما رجحه شيخ الاسلام فيها للوجوه الكثيرة التى بينها الشيخ و ابن القيم
Translation: “As for your question about which view is preferred (rajih) in the matter of the triple divorce, whether pronounced in one word or in several words, it has been established and repeatedly stated that we believe the view which Shaykh al-Islam (Ibn Taymiyyah) preferred is correct, for the many reasons which the Shaykh and Ibn al-Qayyim have explained.”
➍ Shaykh Abdullah bin Abdur Rahman Bassam (may Allah have mercy on him)
The Shaykh has discussed this issue in detail in his commentary on Bulugh al-Maram, Tawdih al-Ahkam (vol. 5, p. 18). First of all, after mentioning the position of the majority of scholars and their evidence, he writes:
Translation: “A group of scholars holds that triple divorce given in one word or in several words results in only one divorce, and this view is narrated from several noble Companions, Tabi’un and the followers of the schools of law. Among the Companions (may Allah be pleased with them), Abu Musa al-Ash’ari, Ibn Abbas, Ibn Mas’ud, Ali, Abdur Rahman bin Awf and al-Zubayr bin al-Awwam (may Allah be pleased with them) held this view.”
Among the Tabi’un, Tawus, Ata’, Jabir bin Zayd, Abdullah bin Musa, Muhammad bin Ishaq (may Allah have mercy on them) and most of the students of Ibn Abbas (may Allah be pleased with him) adopted this view.
Among the followers of the schools of law: Dawud and his students, some students of Imam Abu Hanifah, some students of Imam Malik, some students of Imam Ahmad bin Hanbal (may Allah have mercy on him), likewise Al-Majd Abdus Salam bin Taymiyyah, his grandson Shaykh al-Islam Ibn Taymiyyah, and then his students, foremost among whom is Imam Ibn al-Qayyim, who discussed this issue at length in both books زاد المعاد and إغاثة اللهفان and gave a satisfactory answer to the arguments of the opponents.”
After this, Shaykh Bassam (may Allah have mercy on him) answers the arguments of the majority, and regarding those who take the practice of the Companions as evidence, he writes:
وأما الاستدلال بعمل الصحابة فمن أولاهم بالاقتداء والاتباع ؟ ونحن نقول إنهم يزيدون عن مائة ألف، وكل هذا الجمع الغفير وأولهم نبيهم صلی اللہ علیہ وسلم يعدون الثلاث واحدة، حتى إذا توفي صلی اللہ علیہ وسلم وهى على ذلك، وجاء خليفته الصديق فاستمرت الحال على ذالك حتى توفي، وخلفه عمر فمضى صدر خلافته والأمر كما هو على عهد النبى صلی اللہ علیہ وسلم وعهد الصديق، بعد ذلك جعلت الثلاث كعددها ثلاثا كما بينا سببه، فصار على أن الثلاث واحدة جمهور الصحابة من قضى نحبه قبل خلافة عمر . . . . . فعلمنا حينئذ أن الاستدلال بعمل الصحابة منقوض بما يشبه إجماعهم فى عهد الصديق على خلافه
Translation: “As for using the practice of the Companions as evidence, tell us: who among the Companions (may Allah be pleased with them) has more right to be followed? We say that their number exceeded one hundred thousand, and until the death of the Prophet ﷺ all the Companions (may Allah be pleased with them) counted three divorces as one. Then it was the same in the era of Abu Bakr as well; then in the early years of the era of Umar (may Allah be pleased with him) it remained the same; after that, three began to be counted as three, the reason for which we have already explained. So it is established that until the caliphate of Umar (may Allah be pleased with him), the majority of the Companions (may Allah be pleased with them) regarded three as one. Therefore, using the practice of the Companions as evidence for counting three as three is not correct, because what the Companions (may Allah be pleased with them) were unanimous upon in the era of Abu Bakr is contrary to it.”
After this, explaining the justification of Umar’s (may Allah be pleased with him) decision, Shaykh al-Bassam (may Allah have mercy on him) writes:
Translation: “As far as the decision of Umar (may Allah be pleased with him) is concerned, we can by no means say about him and the other Companions (may Allah be pleased with them) that they deliberately did an act which did not exist in the time of the Messenger of Allah ﷺ. Rather, the real matter is that when they saw people giving three divorces together in large numbers, which is forbidden, they enforced the three divorces as a discretionary penalty (ta’zir) to teach people a lesson. And this act of his was ijtihadi, and ijtihad changes with the difference of time and place; it does not have a permanent status that cannot be changed. The binding and unchangeable ruling is that which existed in this matter from the beginning.”
