The Ruling on Divorce by Writing and Prohibiting a Woman Before the Marriage Contract

Question:
He says: I intended to divorce my wife but did not pronounce the divorce. I sent a message to my family in Egypt and told them that she is to be considered divorced. Is it true that she is considered divorced, or do I owe an expiation? I went to the judge of the Sharia court, but he did not help me; he said, "Ask the mufti," but I could not find a mufti. I ask for your guidance. May Allah reward you with good. Because I had prohibited her twice before the contract due to a disagreement, what is your opinion?

Answer:
If you wrote to your family that she is to be considered divorced, then she is divorced. This counts as one pronouncement of divorce. You have the right to take her back during the waiting period, provided you had not divorced her twice before this. The point is that this statement counts as a divorce, or rather, when you wrote to your family that she is to be considered divorced, this is considered a divorce. She must observe the waiting period. If you take her back during the waiting period before she has menstruated three times, if she is not pregnant, or before she gives birth if she is pregnant, then if you do not take her back, she is separated from you. However, if you take her back during the waiting period before she has menstruated three times, or before she gives birth if she is pregnant, then she remains your wife, provided this is established by two just witnesses who testify that you took her back while she was in the waiting period. If the waiting period ends before you take her back, there is no harm in marrying her with a new contract and a new mahr, if she is willing and agrees to it and her awliya (guardians) agree. The point is that with this divorce, she is divorced with one pronouncement, and you have the right to take her back during the waiting period before it ends. If it ends, you cannot return to her except with a new marriage contract with its conditions considered valid in the Shari'ah. As for the prohibition, if you said that she is haram (forbidden) to you, or like the back of your mother, then there is an expiation for zihar if this was after the marriage contract. If it was before the contract, it has no prohibition and no effect. You only owe the expiation for zihar after the contract. If you said to her after you married her, "She is haram to me," or "Like the back of my mother," or "Like the back of my sister or my grandmother," or something similar, then she is haram to you until you expiate the zihar. The expiation is the freeing of a believing slave. If you are unable to do so, you fast for two consecutive months. If you are unable to do that, you feed sixty poor people, which is thirty sa' (a dry measure of about 3 kg), meaning ninety kilograms. Each poor person receives one and a half kilograms of the local staple food, such as dates, wheat, or rice, before you approach her or touch her. If this was, as you said, before the contract, before you married her, then you do not owe the expiation for zihar, but you owe the expiation for an oath. You owe the expiation for an oath, which is feeding ten poor people, or clothing them, or freeing a slave, as a result of your prohibition of her before you contracted the marriage. If a person prohibits something that Allah has made permissible, he owes the expiation for an oath. For example, if he says, "This food is haram to me," or "This speech is haram to me," or "Entering this house is haram to me," or "Its food is haram to me," he owes the expiation for an oath.