—may Allah bless him and grant him peace—“was approached by two men with a dispute. One of them said, ‘O Messenger of Allah, judge between us according to the Book of Allah.’ The other, who was more knowledgeable than him, said, ‘O Messenger of Allah, judge between us according to the Book of Allah, and allow me to speak. My son was a hired worker for this man and committed adultery with his wife. I paid him a ransom of one hundred sheep and a slave girl. I then asked the people of knowledge, who said, “Your son must receive one hundred lashes and be exiled for a year.”’

“The Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, said, ‘I shall certainly judge between you according to the Book of Allah. The hundred sheep and the slave girl must be returned to you, and your son must receive one hundred lashes and be exiled for a year. Unays, go to this man’s wife in the morning; if she confesses, stone her.’ She confessed, and he stoned her.”

This woman was among those whom the Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, had stoned. He also stoned the two Jews at the door of his mosque, Māʿiz ibn Mālik, the Ghāmidī woman, and others besides them.

This hadith accords with the verse’s explanation of the way Allah provided for them: one hundred lashes and a year’s exile for a virgin, and stoning for a previously married person. However, this hadith specifies flogging and exile for a male virgin, whereas the verse mentions confinement in houses specifically for women.

Some jurists of Iraq do not consider exile obligatory in addition to the prescribed punishment, while others distinguish between men and women. Likewise, most of them do not consider one hundred lashes obligatory in addition to stoning, while some require both, as ʿAlī did with Shurāhah al-Hamdāniyyah: he flogged her and then stoned her, saying:

“I flogged her according to the Book of Allah and stoned her according to the Sunnah of His Prophet.”