The ruling on a husband saying to his wife: “You are forbidden to me.”

The Shaykh : That is, if he says, “My wife is forbidden to me, so I will not do such-and-such,” is this like saying, “It is forbidden for me to do such-and-such”? The majority of scholars hold that it is not like that, and that forbidding one’s wife is zihar. Zihar forbids the one who has committed it from touching his wife until he performs expiation. The expiation is freeing a slave; if he cannot find one, then fasting for two consecutive months; if he is unable to do that, then feeding sixty poor people. However, the correct view is that forbidding one’s wife is like forbidding anything else, meaning that if he says, “My wife is forbidden to me,” and his intention is to take an oath, then it is an oath. This is due to the generality of the statement of Allah the Exalted: . This is a relative pronoun from the forms of generality, and it encompasses everything. Anything that is lawful, if you forbid it with the intention of taking an oath, is an oath. It is authentically reported from Ibn Abbas (may Allah be pleased with him and his father) and a group of the Companions that forbidding one’s wife is like forbidding anything else; if the intention is to take an oath, then it is an oath. This is the end of what we intended to discuss on this matter.