but is merely a follower of scholarly authority who transmits the opinions of others, like someone reporting another person’s account. A witness who testifies about another is not a judge, and someone who merely transmits opinions is a reporter, not a mufti.

This woman’s situation admits only those three possibilities, this view, or the view that performing tawāf al-ifādah (the principal circumambulation) before standing at Arafat suffices when performing it afterwards is impossible. A similar opinion is reported within Mālik’s school concerning someone who forgets the principal circumambulation until he has returned to his homeland: his arrival circumambulation suffices. Yet this offers her no relief, for her menstruation may continue from the time she enters Mecca until the pilgrims depart.

Moreover, this entails performing circumambulation before its appointed time, as established by the Quran, the Sunnah, and scholarly consensus. Pilgrimage rites performed before their appointed times are not valid.

If the choice is between her performing the principal circumambulation in a state of ritual impurity and not performing it at all, then performing it in a state of ritual impurity is preferable. Whether ritual purity is a condition of validity is a well-known point of disagreement. Many scholars, such as Abū Hanīfah and Ahmad, according to one of the two reports from him, hold that even when she is able to observe ritual purity, circumambulation performed while menstruating is valid, though she owes a sacrificial offering. They nevertheless maintain that she sins by doing so. Were she to perform it before standing at Arafat, however, it would not be valid. This position is well known and widely recognised. Thus, it is clear that circumambulation while menstruating is preferable to circumambulation before its appointed time.

Those who hold this view say that ritual purity is an obligation in circumambulation, not a condition of its validity, and that all obligations are waived when one is unable to fulfil them. Hence the view of Abū Hanīfah and others