“Your mothers who suckled you, and your foster-sisters” (al-Nisāʾ 4:23), together with the Prophet’s saying—may God bless him and grant him peace—“Whatever becomes unlawful through suckling is unlawful through birth,” led some to conclude: the sire’s milk is prohibitive.
Those, however, who consider the verse on suckling and the statement “Whatever becomes unlawful through suckling…” to be no more than a foundational exposition of the ruling on suckling—since clarification may not be deferred when the need arises—reply: if that ḥadīth were taken at face value, it would have to abrogate those foundational texts, for any addition that changes a ruling constitutes abrogation. Besides, ʿĀʾishah herself—the very transmitter of the ḥadīth—did not hold that the sire’s milk creates a prohibition.
It is difficult to overturn widely disseminated foundational texts, intended as primary legislation and clarification at the moment of need, by means of isolated reports—especially ones confined to a single incident. For that reason ʿUmar—may God be pleased with him—said, concerning the report of Fāṭimah bint Qays: “We shall not abandon the Book of God for the statement of a woman.”
Issue Eight
Testimony concerning claims of suckling
One group held that only the testimony of two women is admissible.
Another group maintained that nothing less than four women suffices; this was the opinion of al-Shāfiʿī and ʿAṭāʾ.
A third group said that the testimony of a single woman is acceptable.
Those who accept two women’s testimony are themselves divided. Some stipulate that the two must have been known to make the claim publicly before offering formal testimony; this is the position of Mālik and Ibn al-Qāsim. Others do not require such prior publicity—Muṭarrif and Ibn al-Mājishūn among them.
Among those who allow a single woman’s testimony, some impose no requirement of prior publicity; that is the school of Abū Ḥanīfah. Others do require it; this is one report from Mālik, though another report from him states that fewer than two women are never sufficient.
The cause of their disagreement—whether four women are required or only two—lies in their divergent views on women’s testimony: in matters where men ordinarily cannot testify, does each man’s equivalent amount to two women, or are two women adequate in their own right? This question will be addressed, God willing, in the Book of Testimonies.
Their dispute over accepting the testimony of a lone woman stems from the tension between the report in her favor and an agreed-upon principle: judgment is never rendered on the basis of a single male witness, and women’s testimony is either weaker than men’s or, at best, equal to it. Consensus has established that a single witness does not suffice. The report invoked is the ḥadīth of ʿUqbah ibn al-Ḥārith:
“O Messenger of God, I married a woman, and another woman came saying, ‘I nursed both of you.’ The Messenger of God—peace and blessings be upon him—said, ‘How can you keep her when that has been said? Leave her.’”
Some scholars understood this ḥadīth as merely recommendatory, reconciling it with the foundational principles, and that interpretation appears stronger; it is also one report from Mālik.
Issue Nine
As for the qualifications of the wet nurse, the jurists agree that the milk of any woman, whether adult or still below full age,