the scholars of the Maghrib in these later times, both Mālikīs and others. Some shaykhs in Egypt also used to issue fatwas to this effect. This position is also supported by explicit statements transmitted from Imam Ahmad ibn Hanbal and by the principles of his school in several places.

Even if a man “swears an oath invoking a threefold divorce,” saying, “Divorce is binding upon me three times: I shall certainly do such-and-such,” and then does not do it, a group of earlier and later scholars among the followers of Mālik, Ahmad ibn Hanbal, Dāwūd and others have issued fatwas that three divorces do not take effect thereby. Some of them, however, hold that one divorce takes effect. This is reported from a group of the Companions, the Successors and others even concerning divorce pronounced with immediate effect, let alone divorce made conditional or invoked in an oath. This is also the position of those followers of Mālik, Ahmad and Dāwūd who followed them in this regard, whether the divorce is pronounced with immediate effect, made conditional or invoked in an oath. A group of prominent early scholars distinguished in this matter between women whose marriages had been consummated and those whose marriages had not.

Among those who do not regard divorce as taking effect when a man says, “Divorce is binding upon me: I shall certainly do such-and-such,” some hold that no divorce takes effect and do not require him to offer expiation, while others require expiation. Many scholars have issued fatwas according to each of these two opinions. The scholars’ positions on these questions, their exact statements, those who transmitted these positions from them, the books in which they are found, and the evidence supporting these opinions have been set out in detail elsewhere, in discussions amounting to several volumes.