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Does divorce occur if you swore by divorce upon your wife that she would not go to her family's house, then she went and stood with her mother outside the house without entering it?

1 min readAlso available in العربية

The majority of scholars are of the opinion that swearing by divorce (talaq) leads to the occurrence of divorce upon breaking the oath, whether the intention was divorce itself, or threat, or prevention, or urging, or affirmation. Imam Ibn Taymiyyah disagreed with them, holding the view that swearing by divorce, when the intention is not divorce but rather a threat or affirmation, takes the ruling of an oath by Allah, requiring an expiation for an oath (kaffarat yamin) and not resulting in divorce. The determination of what was sworn upon is referred back to the intention of the one who swore the oath. If no intention is found, then it is referred back to the reason for the oath. So, if you intended only to prevent your wife from entering her family's house, then there is no breaking of the oath unless she enters the house. But if you intended to prevent her from going altogether, then you have broken the oath by her going. If there was no specific intention, then what matters is the reason that prompted the oath. It is preferable to present the matter to trusted scholars.

Summarized from the full answer at Ftawy · reviewed Sep 2, 2026

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