Proposing marriage is forbidden for someone in a state of iḥrām, because the proposal is a stepping-stone to the marriage contract, and the contract is a stepping-stone to sexual intercourse, which is itself prohibited until both releases from iḥrām have been completed. Intercourse is the gravest of all iḥrām violations.

Al-Bukhārī (5114) and Muslim (1410) report from Ibn ʿAbbās that “the Prophet ﷺ married Maymūnah while he was in iḥrām, and consummated the marriage after he had exited iḥrām.” The scholars have deemed this narration from Ibn ʿAbbās erroneous, for Maymūnah herself said, “The Prophet ﷺ married me when he was not in iḥrām,” and Abū Rāfiʿ likewise stated, “I was the emissary between them, and he married her while he was not in iḥrām.” Ibn al-Musayyib said—and Qāḍī ʿIyāḍ agreed—that this lone report of Ibn ʿAbbās is contradicted by the majority of Companions. Among those who contradicted him were Maymūnah and Abū Rāfiʿ, both more fully acquainted with the incident because they were directly involved in it.

The wisdom behind forbidding women to a pilgrim in iḥrām is to keep him distant from the pleasures and adornments of worldly life so that his heart may be wholly devoted to acts of the Hereafter and to whatever draws him nearer to Allah, exalted be He.

Shaykh Taqī al-Dīn said: rafath denotes sexual intercourse, and among the iḥrām prohibitions nothing nullifies the Hajj except intercourse itself; if the pilgrim has intercourse, his Hajj is invalid. Ibn al-Munḏir, al-Wazīr, and others transmitted the consensus of the scholars that a pilgrimage is rendered void by intercourse occurring before the first release from iḥrām, and that nothing else nullifies it, whether ejaculation occurs or not.

The well-known view of Imam Aḥmad is that intercourse invalidates the Hajj in every case—whether the pilgrim is aware or unaware, forgetful or deliberate—and this is the opinion held by the majority of scholars. A second report from Imam Aḥmad maintains that the Hajj of the one who forgets, is ignorant, or is coerced is not invalidated; this is the view of al-Shāfiʿī and was preferred by Shaykh Taqī al-Dīn and the author of al-Fāʾiq. Those who hold this view say that such a person incurs neither expiation nor the obligation to repeat the Hajj, based on clear indications from the Quran and Sunnah.

Al-Wazīr said: The scholars agree that if a pilgrim engages in sexual contact short of intercourse before standing at ʿArafah, he must offer a sacrificial animal, but his Hajj is not invalidated. Al-Muwaffaq stated, “We know of no disagreement on this point.”