Al-Sharḥ al-Mumtiʿ - Ibn al-'Uthaymin - (13/42)

Al-Sharḥ al-MumtiʿIbn al-'Uthaymin

As for the evidence from the sunnah: it is the hadith of Ibn Abbas, may Allah be pleased with them, narrated by Muslim in his Sahih: “During the lifetime of the Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be upon him, the caliphate of Abu Bakr, and the first two years of Umar’s caliphate, a threefold divorce counted as one. Then, when people began to pronounce it frequently, Umar, may Allah be pleased with him, said: ‘I see that people have hastened in a matter in which they previously had time for deliberation. What if we enforce it upon them?’ So he enforced it upon them.” (1)

This indicates that enforcing the three pronouncements as three was among Umar’s discretionary rulings, and that he, may Allah be pleased with him, did so as a matter of public policy, not because this was what the evidences required. For if people were held to a threefold divorce, they would refrain from it. When a person knows that, if he says, “You are divorced, you are divorced, you are divorced,” it counts as one, he finds it easy to say it again. But when he knows that, if he says it, he will be separated from his wife, he will not say it; rather, he will deliberate. This is why it was part of Umar’s policy, may Allah be pleased with him, to hold people to the implications of their words.

Our Shaykh Abd al-Rahman ibn Sa‘di, may Allah have mercy on him, chose this view and said: “Shaykh al-Islam presented proofs for it such that no one who reflects upon them can permissibly hold a contrary view.” This view is the correct one.

Shaykh al-Islam explicitly stated that there is no difference between saying, “You are divorced three times,” and saying, “You are divorced; you are divorced; you are divorced.” What he, may Allah have mercy on him, mentioned accords with the position of the jurists on this issue, for those who held that it takes effect as three said that, during the Prophet’s lifetime, a person would repeat, “You are divorced,” as an emphasis, not as a fresh pronouncement, because they regarded three pronouncements as forbidden and thus could not have uttered them. But afterwards, people’s fear diminished

(1) Its source has previously been cited on p. 20.

أما دلالة السنة: فحديث ابن عباس ﵄ الذي أخرجه مسلم في صحيحه قال: «كان الطلاق الثلاث على عهد رسول الله ﷺ وعهد أبي بكر وسنتين من خلافة عمر واحدة، فلما أكثر الناس ذلك قال عمر ﵁: أرى الناس قد استعجلوا في أمر كانت لهم فيه أناة، فلو أمضيناه عليهم فأمضاه عليهم (١)، وهذا يدل على أن إمضاء الثلاث من اجتهادات عمر، وأنه ﵁ إنما صنع ذلك سياسة، لا أن هذا مقتضى الأدلة؛ لأنه إذا ألزم الناس بالطلاق الثلاث كفّوا عنه؛ لأن الإنسان إذا علم أنه إذا قال: أنت طالق أنت طالق أنت طالق، فهي واحدة، يهون عليه أن يقولها مرة أخرى، لكن إذا علم أنه إذا قالها حيل بينه وبين زوجته فإنه لا يقولها، بل يتريث، فلهذا كان من سياسة عمر ﵁ أن ألزم الناس بمقتضى قولهم. واختار هذا القول شيخنا عبد الرحمن بن سعدي ﵀ وقال: إن شيخ الإسلام ساق على هذا أدلة لا يسوغ لمن تأملها أن يقول بخلافه، وهذا القول هو الصواب. وقد صرَّح شيخ الإسلام بأنه لا فرق بين أن يقول: أنت طالق ثلاثاً، أو أنت طالق، أنت طالق، أنت طالق، وما ذكره ﵀ هو مقتضى قول الفقهاء في هذه المسألة؛ لأن الذين قالوا: إنه يقع ثلاثاً قالوا: إنه في عهد الرسول كان الواحد منهم يكرر أنت طالق توكيداً، لا تأسيساً؛ لأنهم يرون أن الثلاث حرام، فلا يمكن أن يقولوها، لكن بعد ذلك قلَّ خوف الناس

(١) سبق تخريجه ص (٢٠).