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Fatwa CenterSwore many oaths regarding divorcing his wife
Question
Before when I didn't know all the truth I said if I keep my wife I am not a Muslim and I swore to divorce her too many times; but now I know the truth and I want to keep my wife. So what can I do?
Answer
Praise be to Allah, the Lord of the Worlds; and may His blessings and peace be upon our Prophet Muhammad and upon all his Family and Companions.
Your statement "if I keep my wife I am no longer a Muslim," has no effect on your wife. Its impact is on you.
The Prophet (Sallallahu Alaihi wa Sallam) said: "Whoever says an oath saying I am exempt from Islam, if this is a lie then he is still as he is (a Muslim). But if he is truthful (sincere) then he will not return to Islam unharmed."
You have to repent from that. The conditions of repentance are: to give up committing the sin, to regret having done it, and to be sincerely determined not to return to it again.
As regards your oath to divorce many times, unfortunately you did not tell us the wording of your oath.
Anyway, the majority of the Fuqaha are of the view that whoever says: "I have to divorce if I do such and such," then his wife is divorced if he does that. The ruling is the same, whether he made an oath not to do something, and he did it, or made an oath on her not to do something and she did it or to do something and refused to do it. Some other people of knowledge are of the view that if the husband intended the divorce if his wife does what he conditioned the divorce on, then she is divorced if she does it, but if he only intended to swear then divorce does not take place, but he has to expiate for the oath.
Nonetheless, we advise you to do two things:
First, you should go to the Islamic court or the Islamic centre in the country where you are living, and tell them in details the wording with which you made the oath. They will, Insha Allah, give you the ruling.
Second, you have to stop making any oath of divorce, because that is an evil oath that Allah forbade us to make.
The Prophet (Sallallahu Alaihi wa Sallam) said: "Whoever swears (or makes on oath), he has to swear by Allah or not to swear." [Reported by Bukhari and Muslim]
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