a vow involving disobedience to the Lord, severing ties of kinship, or something you do not own.”
Thus, the Commander of the Faithful, Umar ibn al-Khattab (may Allah be pleased with him), instructed this man—who had sworn using a conditional formula and made a vow in obstinacy and anger—to make expiation for his oath and not carry out what he had vowed. He cited what he had heard the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) say: “You are bound by neither an oath nor a vow involving disobedience to the Lord, severing ties of kinship, or something you do not own.”
It was therefore understood that if a person binds himself by an oath or vow to commit an act of disobedience or sever ties of kinship, he must not fulfil that vow; rather, he is required to make expiation, as Umar instructed him. Had Umar not regarded this vow as an oath, he would not have told him, “Make expiation for your oath.” The Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) said, “There is neither an oath nor a vow,” because an oath is intended to urge someone to act or restrain him from acting, whereas a vow is intended as an act of devotion; neither is to be fulfilled when it entails disobedience or the severing of kinship ties.
This hadith provides another indication: the Prophet’s words (peace and blessings be upon him), “There is neither an oath nor a vow involving disobedience to the Lord or the severing of kinship ties,” encompass everything termed an oath or a vow. This applies whether the oath is sworn by Allah, consists of making obligatory something that is not obligatory—such as charity, fasting, Hajj, or a sacrificial offering—or is sworn by making something lawful forbidden, as through zihār, divorce, or manumission.
The Prophet’s intent (peace and blessings be upon him) may have been only to prohibit carrying out the sinful or kinship-severing act that was sworn to; alternatively, he may also have intended that whatever the oath or vow purported to make obligatory or forbidden does not become binding upon the person.
The latter is the apparent meaning, as shown by Umar ibn al-Khattab’s reliance upon the hadith as evidence, for