They also cited reports from the Companions. ʿUmar, in the presence of a number of them, said, “Do not sell a slave girl who has reached the age of menstruation; she must be kept until she menstruates. If she has not yet menstruated, then keep her for forty-five nights.”
Allah has imposed a ʿidda on the woman who has ceased to menstruate and on the one who has not yet reached the age of menses, setting it at three months; istibrāʾ is the ʿidda of the slave woman.
Imam Mālik held that istibrāʾ is not required when the owner is certain that the slave woman’s womb is empty; he may have relations with her from the moment he acquires her. He argued that the objective of istibrāʾ is simply to verify that the womb is clear, so if certainty already exists it is not obligatory. Al-Bukhārī reports in his Ṣaḥīḥ from Ibn ʿUmar: “If the slave girl is a virgin, he need not perform istibrāʾ for her, should he so wish.”
Al-Māzarī, a Mālikī scholar, summarized the matter as follows:
• Every slave woman whose pregnancy can safely be ruled out requires no istibrāʾ.
• Every woman whose pregnancy is doubtful must undergo istibrāʾ.
• Every woman whose womb is most probably empty, yet pregnancy remains possible, is the subject of two opinions:
- istibrāʾ is obligatory;
- istibrāʾ is waived.
Two ancillary notes:
First: Ibn al-Qayyim observed that the Sunnah explicitly requires istibrāʾ for a pregnant woman by her delivery and for a menstruating woman by one period. Why, then, was nothing said about the post-menopausal woman or the one who has not yet menstruated, even though they are addressed in the rules of ʿidda?
The reply is that nothing was left unsaid—praise be to Allah. Rather, their ruling is indicated implicitly: Allah, exalted be He, set the ʿidda of the free woman at three menstrual cycles, and He set the ʿidda of the post-menopausal woman and the one who has not yet menstruated at three months. From this it is understood that He