—a ruling on which there is unanimous agreement.
Ibn al-Mundhir said, “I know of no scholarly disagreement over its prohibition and the invalidity of such a contract; the people of knowledge are all of one mind on this.” Ibn Ḥazm, al-Qurṭubī, and al-Nawawī likewise record the consensus.
- Shaykh al-Islām remarked: With regard to the women forbidden through lineage, the governing principle is that every female blood-relative of a man is unlawful for him, except the daughters of his paternal uncles, the daughters of his maternal uncles, the daughters of his paternal aunts, and the daughters of his maternal aunts. These four categories Allah has permitted.
I add: As for the rule concerning the prohibition of joining two women in marriage, some scholars have stated: it is forbidden to combine any two women such that, were one of them a man and the other a woman, marriage between them would have been unlawful.
Benefits
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Ibn Rushd said: They agree unanimously that milk-kinship renders unlawful whatever blood-kinship renders unlawful; the nursing mother takes the place of the biological mother, and every woman prohibited through lineage is likewise prohibited through breastfeeding. Al-Muwaffaq declared: We know of no dissent on this point.
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Al-Muwaffaq also said: Once a man merely contracts a marriage with a woman, every mother of hers—whether by lineage or by breastfeeding, near or distant—becomes forbidden to him forthwith. This is the position of the four Imams and the majority of scholars.
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The Wazīr stated: They concur that if a man consummates marriage with a woman, her daughter becomes permanently forbidden to him, even if she has never been in his household; the restriction mentioned in the verse is simply the common case. Ibn al-Mundhir added: The scholars of every major center agree that if a man marries a woman and then divorces her or she dies before consummation, her daughter remains lawful for him.
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The Shaykh said: Affinity-based prohibitions do not find an equivalent in milk-kinship; therefore, it is not forbidden for a man to marry:
(1) the milk-mother of his wife.