If, after pronouncing the divorce, he adds, “one—and I have no right to take you back,” such a proviso is invalid: the right of revocation remains because he clearly said “one,” unless he actually intended three; in that case, Mālik deems it three.

Should he say, “You are divorced—a divorce after which I have no right to you,” the act counts as three divorces, unless he intended only one; that unspoken intention is considered when issuing a legal opinion but not in a court ruling.

If he declares, “You are divorced, irrevocably,” without specifying “one irrevocable divorce,” Mālik has three reported positions: at one time he judged it a single irrevocable divorce like khulʿ (compensatory divorce), at another that it is revocable, and at a third that it is three. The same divergence appears when a man says, “You are divorced with the divorce of khulʿ”: once Mālik held it to be a single irrevocable divorce unless more was intended, and another time that it is revocable.

In my own view, when a man tells his wife, “You are divorced,” the divorce is not irrevocable—whether or not he adds “the divorce of khulʿ”—unless she actually ransoms herself from him with something he accepts, little or much, in light of Allah’s words, “Their husbands have a better right to take them back” (al-Baqarah 2:228), meaning during the waiting period. Whoever says, “You are divorced—the whole divorce,” effects three divorces.

Mālik likewise differed about a man’s statement, “I have separated from you,” or “I have released you.” One report counts it as an explicit formula of divorce like “You are divorced”; another treats it as an indirect expression that depends on the speaker’s intention, so he is asked how many divorces he meant, whether or not the marriage was consummated. A further report from Mālik states that if a man says to his wife, “I have released you, and you are divorced—a release,” she becomes irrevocably separated by three divorces.

Whoever tells his wife, “You are divorced—the divorce of hardship,” effects three divorces.

As for indirect expressions (kināyāt), they include a man’s saying to his wife: “You are disassociated from me,” “You are free,” “You are separated,” “You are utterly severed,” “You are forbidden to me,” “Return to your family,” or “I have given you back to your family.”