Section
The Categories of Bleeding Experienced by Women
The blood a woman experiences falls into three categories: menstrual bleeding; irregular bleeding, also called bleeding due to illness or a disorder; and postnatal bleeding.
Menstrual bleeding is blood discharged from the vagina in the normal course of menstruation, rather than because of illness or childbirth. It is something Allah has ordained for the daughters of Adam, making it a means of safeguarding lineage and a sign that the womb is free of pregnancy. It has also been said that menstruation was first imposed upon the Children of Israel. The former view is more evident in meaning, while the latter is more sound in transmission.
Postnatal bleeding is blood normally discharged from the vagina following childbirth. It entails the same obligations and precludes the same acts as menstruation.
Irregular bleeding is bleeding beyond that of menstruation and childbirth. It results from illness or a disorder and does not, in itself, entail any obligatory ruling. According to Mālik and his followers, a woman experiencing irregular bleeding is recommended to perform ablution for each prayer. Some scholars have recommended that her husband refrain from intercourse with her, while others have recommended that she take a ritual bath each day at noon. Al-Bukhārī reports from Umm Habībah that she used to take a ritual bath for every prayer. The hadith does not state that the Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, commanded her to do so; perhaps she did so voluntarily as a precaution.
Al-Khattābī said that not every woman experiencing irregular bleeding is required to take a ritual bath for each prayer. This is obligatory only for the woman termed “uncertain”: one who cannot distinguish the types of blood and either has never had an established menstrual pattern or once had one but has forgotten it and no longer knows its duration. Such a woman must take a ritual bath for every prayer, since that time may coincide with the cessation of her menstrual bleeding.
A woman in this condition must not have intercourse with her husband. She fasts Ramadan with everyone else, then makes it up afterwards, so that she may be certain she has completed thirty days at times when she was permitted to fast. If she is performing Hajj, she performs the circumambulation twice, fifteen days apart, so that she may be certain