perform the Hajj according to the school of Mālik ibn Anas,” or “Such-and-such is binding upon me according to the view of those Muslim jurists who hold it binding,” or “Such-and-such is binding upon me according to the strictest opinion ever expressed in Islam,” or “Such-and-such is binding upon me: I shall not seek a fatwa from anyone who permits expiation for an oath sworn by divorce,” or “Divorce is binding upon me: I shall not do such-and-such, nor shall I seek a fatwa from anyone who allows me release from my oath or a way to retract it”—or similar expressions that intensify the obligation, reinforcing the binding force of the conditional commitment if the oath is broken, so as to prevent him from breaking his oath.

When someone swears an oath, he wishes to reinforce it by every means of emphasis that comes to mind, and to prevent himself from breaking it by every means available to him. None of this, however, takes these commitments outside the category of oaths for which expiation is prescribed. However solemnly he reinforces oaths for which Allah has prescribed expiation, and even if he intends never to break them under any circumstances, this does not change Allah’s law.

People’s oaths do not alter the laws of the religion. Rather, whatever Allah commanded before a person’s oath remains commanded after it; the oath merely reinforces it. No one may issue a fatwa permitting someone to abandon what Allah has made obligatory or to do what Allah has forbidden, even if he has sworn no oath concerning it. How much more so, then, if he has sworn such an oath?

This is like someone swearing to fulfil his obligations: prayer, zakat, fasting, Hajj, dutifulness to parents, maintaining ties of kinship, obeying the ruler and offering him sincere counsel, refraining from rebellion against him or fighting him, repaying his debts, rendering rights to those entitled to them, and abstaining from injustice, shameful deeds, and the like. These matters were obligatory before the oath, and the oath makes their obligation still more emphatic.