What Are the Conditions That Must Be Met for a Divorce to Be Valid?


Shafi'i Fiqh

Answered by Shaykh Dr. Muhammad Abu Bakr Badhib

Question

What are the conditions that must be met for a divorce to be valid?

Answer

In the name of Allah, and all praise is due to Allah, and blessings and peace be upon our master Muhammad, the Messenger of Allah, his Family, his Companions, and those who follow him.


Conditions

When divorce is issued by a person, it does not take effect unless certain conditions are fulfilled. According to the Shafi‘i School, these conditions are:

Valid Marriage

The marriage must be valid and properly established. If the marriage itself is not valid or lacks the necessary requirements, then by default, the divorce will not be valid.


Sanity and Maturity

The person issuing the divorce must be sane and mature. Therefore, the divorce of a minor, an insane person, or someone who is asleep is not considered valid. This also applies to a drunken person unless they are coerced.

Free Will

The divorce must be given voluntarily. Thus, the divorce of a person who is coerced or forced into it under complete and valid compulsion (according to Sacred Law) is not considered valid.

Summary

These are the key conditions that must be present for a husband’s pronouncement of divorce to be valid. For more detailed information, one may refer to “al-Fiqh al-Manhaji”, a contemporary book on Shafi‘i Fiqh, as well as other classical texts and commentaries of the Shafi‘i School.

[Shaykh] Dr. Muhammad Abu Bakr Badhib

Shaykh Dr Muhammad Abu Bakr Badhib is a prominent Islamic scholar from Yemen born in Shibam, Hadhramaut, in 1976. He received his degree in Shari‘a from Al-Ahqaf University, a master’s degree from the Islamic University of Beirut, and a PhD in Usul al-Din from Aligarh Muslim University (AMU).

He studied under great scholars such as Shaykh al-Habib Ahmad Mashhur al-Haddad, Shaykh Fadl Ba‘ fadl, Habib Salim al-Shatiri, Habib Ali Mashhur bin Hafeez, and others. He has served as the Director of Publications at Dar al-Fiqh, the former Deputy Director of Cultural Relations at Al-Ahqaf University, a former Assistant for Employee Affairs at Atiyah Iron Company, a researcher at the Sunna Center affiliated with the Dallah al-Baraka Foundation, and a researcher at Al-Furqan Foundation’s Makka al-Mukarrama and Madina al-Munawwara Encyclopedia branch.

Currently, he is a researcher at Al-Furqan Foundation’s Makka al-Mukarrama and Madina al-Munawwara Encyclopedia branch, teaches traditionally through the Ijaza system at Dar al-Fuqaha in Turkey, supervises the Arabic department at Nur al-Huda International Institute (SeekersGuidance), and is a member of the Board of Trustees of the Manuscript House in Istanbul.

His works include “The Efforts of Hadhramaut Jurists in Serving the Shafi‘i School,” “Contributions of Hadhramaut Scholars in Spreading Islam and its Sciences in India,” “Hada’iq al-Na‘im in Shafi‘i Fiqh,” in addition to verifying several books in Fiqh, history, the art of biographies, and Asanid (chains of narration).