As for the first and the third girls, nothing happens to their contracts, whereas the second wife’s marriage is cancelled once the third girl has been nursed; according to another opinion, even that second contract does not lapse. The same two views apply when a man has two minor wives who are suckled successively by an unrelated woman: are both marriages annulled or only that of the second?

Section
If a woman—say, Hind—declares of another, “She is my daughter” or “my sister through breast-feeding,” or she says of a man, “He is my brother,” then marriage between the two becomes unlawful. If both spouses say, “There is a milk-relationship between us that bars marriage,” they are separated; the named dower is void, and, if intercourse has occurred, the husband must pay an equivalent mahr.

If the husband alone claims such a relationship while the wife denies it, the marriage is dissolved; she keeps the full named dower if consummation has taken place, otherwise half of it. If the wife is the one who claims it and the husband denies it, he is believed on oath provided that she entered the marriage with her own consent; if not, the stronger opinion is that she is believed. In that event she is entitled to an equivalent mahr if intercourse occurred; otherwise she receives nothing.

Whoever denies the milk-relationship swears only that he has no knowledge of it, whereas the claimant must swear positively that it exists. It is proven by the testimony of either two men, one man and two women, or four women. An acknowledgment is accepted only if made before two men.

The wet-nurse’s testimony is admissible so long as she neither requests payment nor describes her own act; the sounder opinion is that even if she does say, “I nursed him,” her statement is accepted. The stronger view holds that it is insufficient merely to say, “There is a prohibiting milk-relationship between them”; she must specify the time, the number of nursings, and that the milk actually reached the child’s stomach. This may be ascertained by seeing the milk expressed and swallowed, or by indications such as the child taking the breast, sucking, and the movement of his throat as he gulps and swallows, once she knows that she is lactating.