Radd al-Muhtar

Radd al-Muhtār 'ala al-Durr al-Mukhtār (Arabic: رد المحتار على الدر المختار‎) is a book on Islamic jurisprudence (fiqh) by 18th century Islamic scholar, Ibn 'Abidin, whose title translates to "Guiding the Baffled to The Exquisite Pearl".

Quotes

• The Durr-ul-Mukhtar declares, ‘A man divorces his wife once after consummation, then renders that one divorce three, it is all right, just as when a man repudiates his wife with a reversible divorce and then turns it, before retracting, into absolute.’ A man says the word Aituddi thrice and intends a repudiation by the first and menses by the rest, he will be believed judicially, because he has intended (in his second and third repetition of the term) to use it in its original sense, but if he makes no intention thereby, i.e. by his second and third repetition of the term, three repudiations will be effected, because his intention of repudiation by the first use of the term shows the state of his mind. Two divorces will be effected if he intends by the second use of the term only to effect a repudiation, but one only will be effected if he intends to repudiate only by the third repetition of the term. And it will not be effected (at all) if by none of the three (repetitions) he meant to effect a divorce. Twenty-four different results follow from various uses of the term Aituddi as has been mentioned by Kamal. To these may be added one more case in which the speaker means to effect only one repudiation by every repetition of the term. In such a case one will take effect according to conscience, and three according to law.
  • quoted in Arun Shourie - The World of Fatwas Or The Sharia in Action (2012, Harper Collins)

• In the great classic of Sunni law, the Durr-ul-Mukhtar, the work that is treated as gospel by so many of our authorities giving fatwas, we read: A husband says, ‘If my wife’s mother does not come to me tonight, my wife is divorced,’ and there are witnesses who testify that, indeed, the mother did not come to him in the night, the wife is out.
  • quoted in Arun Shourie - The World of Fatwas Or The Sharia in Action (2012, Harper Collins)

• The counsel that to the extent possible one should not divorce a woman during her menses again has nothing to do with protecting her interests. The reason is the same one on account of which the divorced woman is prohibited from remarrying until she has completed three menstruations: the object is to preclude subsequent disputes about the paternity of a child that may be born later on. This becomes evident from considering the attitude of the jurists in the case of girls who are too young to bear children and to that of women who are too old to do so. Do the jurists require that the husband pause and reconsider? Here is the answer in Durr-ul-Mukhtar: And it is valid to divorce them, that is a woman whose menstruation has stopped on account of old age, and a minor girl, and a pregnant woman, soon after having sexual enjoyment (with them), because the prohibition (against repudiation soon after having sexual enjoyment) in case of wives subject to menstruation is due to the suspicion (or possibility) of the wife being pregnant, but this is impossible here (that is in the case of wives who are too old or too young)
  • quoted in Arun Shourie - The World of Fatwas Or The Sharia in Action (2012, Harper Collins)