The first position is the soundest, because the inducement and restraint involved in an oath are analogous to obedience and disobedience in relation to commands and prohibitions. Someone who swears an oath concerning himself, his slave, a relative, or a friend whom he expects to obey him is seeking the performance of whatever he has sworn should be done and preventing whatever he has sworn should be left undone. By his oath, he reinforces his request or prohibition, making it equivalent to an emphatic command or prohibition.

The evidence of the Quran and Sunnah establishes that anyone who does something forbidden out of forgetfulness or by mistake incurs no sin and is not considered disobedient or in breach of the command. Likewise, someone who performs the act covered by an oath out of forgetfulness or by mistake does not thereby break or contravene his oath. This includes someone who acts on the basis of an interpretation, follows someone who has given him a fatwa, follows a deceased scholar, or exercises independent scholarly judgment, whether correctly or mistakenly. Whenever he does not deliberately contravene his oath, but believes that what he has done does not contravene it, he does not break his oath.

This includes someone who concludes a khulʿ (marital dissolution in exchange for compensation) and then performs the act covered by his oath, believing that his oath does not extend to acts performed after the khulʿ. According to those who hold that this oath-related khulʿ is invalid—which is the soundest scholarly position—this case falls under the ruling on an oath sworn by someone acting in ignorance on the basis of an interpretation. Those who consider it valid, however, say that he performed the act covered by his oath during a period of irrevocable separation. If the woman performs the act covered by the oath after irrevocable separation and the expiry of her waiting period, the man does not break his oath, by scholarly agreement. The same applies if she performs it during the waiting period following an irrevocable divorce, according to the majority, including Mālik, al-Shāfiʿī, and Ahmad, who hold that a subsequent divorce cannot take effect against a woman whose marriage has been dissolved through khulʿ.

Abū Hanīfah, however, holds that a subsequent divorce can take effect against her. According to him, therefore, the man breaks his oath if the stipulated condition is fulfilled during the period of irrevocable separation. And if the man were a layman and were told, “Conclude a khulʿ with your wife and perform the act covered by your oath,” but did not understand the meaning of khulʿ and assumed it to be merely a divorce