While a woman is with her husband, no one may propose marriage to her, either explicitly or indirectly, by Muslim consensus. If she has not yet married another man, the man who divorced her three times may not propose to her, either explicitly or indirectly, by Muslim consensus. Proposing to her in this situation is more serious than proposing to her after she has married the second husband.

Yet one of “those involved in such marriages” may make an arrangement with a woman divorced three times, and the two resolve—before her waiting period has ended and before she has married the second husband—to marry after that second marriage, the marriage intended to make her lawful again for her former husband. He gives her money to pay the witnesses to this marriage contract and the intermediary husband, and provides for her during the waiting period following that marriage. The intermediary husband gives her neither a dowry nor maintenance during her waiting period nor maintenance upon divorce.

If Muslims agree that the first husband may not propose to her—either explicitly or indirectly—while she is married to the second husband, how much more serious is it if he proposes before she has married the second husband? Likewise, if, after the second husband divorces her, the first husband may neither make secret promises to her nor resolve to conclude the marriage contract until the prescribed waiting period has ended, how much more serious is it if he does so before the second husband divorces her—indeed, before he even marries her, or even before her waiting period following divorce from the first husband has ended? All of this is forbidden by Muslim consensus, yet many of those involved in such marriages do it.

There is no form of marriage arranged to make a woman lawful again for her former husband whose permissibility Muslims unanimously accept, nor any form expressly permitted by a scriptural text. Rather, some forms are forbidden by Muslim consensus, while others are disputed among the scholars. As for the Companions, it is not established that the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) cursed anyone among them as either the man who contracts such a marriage or the former husband for whose benefit it is contracted. This and other considerations show that some forms of such marriages are worse than temporary marriage and the like