Chapter: Conditional Divorce

His statement, “Making divorce conditional upon a condition”: this means making it contingent upon something that has already occurred or something that has not yet occurred—that is, something that will occur in the future—by means of in (if) or one of its equivalents. Thus, if he says, “If you have spoken to Zayd, then you are divorced,” this is contingent upon something that has already occurred. If he says, “If you speak to Zayd, then you are divorced,” this is contingent upon something that has not yet occurred. In other words, he has made the divorce contingent either upon something that happened or upon something that will happen.

Is making divorce conditional upon conditions legally valid, or is it void? Some scholars say that it is void, and that a divorce made conditional upon a condition takes effect immediately. They cite the Prophet’s saying: “Whoever introduces into this matter of ours that which is not from it, it is rejected” (1). Divorce was not prescribed in a conditional form, neither in the Quran nor in the sunnah. Accordingly, if he makes it conditional, the divorce takes effect immediately and the condition is disregarded.

If someone were to take the opposite view—namely, that it never takes effect at all, based on the hadith, “Whoever introduces into this matter of ours that which is not from it, it is rejected”—this too would have some basis. The difference between this view and the first is that the first view disregards only the condition, whereas this view disregards the entire statement.

However, most scholars hold that making divorce conditional upon conditions is valid, based on the general purport of the hadith: “Muslims are bound by their conditions, except a condition that makes lawful what is unlawful or makes unlawful what is lawful” (2). Although there is some weakness in its chain, it