from ʿAlī (Allah be pleased with him). However, an authentic wording has been established from Ibn Masʿūd: “The impotent husband is granted a year’s reprieve; if he consummates during that time, well and good, otherwise the two are separated.” Ibn Abī Shaybah recorded it (2/4) with a sound chain of transmission.

Glossary of terms
• barṣāʾ (a woman with vitiligo): whiteness that appears on the body as the aftermath of an illness.
• majnūnah (insane): loss or corruption of reason.
• majdhūmah (leprous): leprosy, a disease that eats away at the limbs and causes them to fall off; it is contagious.
• masīsih (his “touch” of her): a euphemism for intercourse and enjoyment, as in the other wording, “If he has touched her, she is entitled to the dowry for what he lawfully enjoyed of her.”
• man gharr-rahā (whoever deceived him about her): whoever tricked or defrauded him concerning her condition.
• qaran: a rounded growth that emerges in a woman’s womb and lies between the two passages, preventing intercourse altogether or in full.
• ʿinnīn (impotent man): a disability that prevents a man from intercourse because his organ does not become erect. The term is derived from the verb ʿanna, “to impede,” for his organ is “impeded” when he wishes to penetrate.
• yuʾajjalu (he is granted a respite): passive form of the verb “to defer,” meaning he is given a delay of one year so that his condition becomes clear through the passing of the four seasons.

Lessons drawn from the two reports

1. Both ḥadiths indicate that the marriage contract remains valid even when a defect exists in one of the spouses and the other was unaware of it, for the defect does not vitiate the essence of the contract nor any of its conditions of validity.
2. They also show that the option of annulment on account of a defect belongs to the spouse who only discovered the defect after the contract and did not consent to it; such a spouse is entitled to rescind the marriage.