to my wife?” He said: “No, for Allah does not love lying.” He said: “O Messenger of Allah, [what if] I seek to reconcile with her and to win her affection?” He said: “There is no blame upon you.”

This is how it appears, mursal, from ‘Ata’ ibn Yasar. Al-Humaydi included it under “The Hadiths of Umm Kulthum bint ‘Uqbah ibn Abi Mu‘ayt, may Allah be pleased with her,” so I do not know whether her name was omitted from the chain—whether by al-Humaydi or by a copyist—or whether the narration in al-Humaydi is mursal in this form.

The chain to ‘Ata’ ibn Yasar is authentic, and it has been narrated with a connected chain through another route from her.

Muslim (8/28) and Ahmad (6/403, 404) narrated it by way of Ibn Shihab, from Humayd ibn ‘Abd al-Rahman ibn ‘Awf, from his mother Umm Kulthum bint ‘Uqbah, who said: “I never heard the Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be upon him, grant a concession for any kind of lying except in three cases: a man who says something intending reconciliation; a man who says something in war; and a man speaking to his wife, and a woman speaking to her husband.”

It has a supporting witness, with similar wording, in the hadith of Asma’ bint Yazid.

Al-Tirmidhi (1/352) and Ahmad (6/454, 459, 460) narrated it by way of Shahr ibn Hawshab, from her.

Al-Tirmidhi said: “A good hadith.”

Regarding the words, “and a man speaking to his wife ...,” Qadi ‘Iyad said:

“It may refer to what each spouse tells the other about the love and delight he or she feels for the other, even if it is untrue, because it promotes reconciliation and the continuance of affection.”

I say: It is not among the permitted forms of lying for a man to promise her something that he does not intend to fulfil, or to tell her that he bought a particular item for such-and-such a price—meaning, more than its actual price—in order to please her. For that may be exposed to her, causing her to think ill of her husband; and that is corruption, not reconciliation.