"If the acceptance precedes, it is not valid; and if it is delayed after the offer, it is valid as long as they remain in the assembly."
Machine translationRead the Arabic original
The Shaykh : He said "If the acceptance precedes, it is not valid", meaning that it is a condition that the offer precedes; the offer must come first. One says, "I give you in marriage," and the other says, "I accept." Why? Because the contract does not exist without it, and because the acceptance is the acceptance of something that has been offered. How can the acceptance precede the offer when nothing has been offered up to that point? Therefore, the offer must precede the acceptance. If the offer is delayed after the acceptance and the acceptance comes first, it is not valid. But what is the way to make it valid? The way is to repeat the acceptance after the offer, because the preceding acceptance occurred in an inappropriate place. So when the offer comes, it is followed by the acceptance, and it becomes valid. For example, a man said—and the husband, upon attending the contract, spoke in the colloquial dialect, because the uncle is the father's brother, but they call the wife's father an uncle—he said, "O uncle, I accept the marriage of your daughter so-and-so." The uncle said to him, "I give you my daughter so-and-so in marriage." Is the contract valid or not?
The questioner : It is not valid.
The Shaykh : How do we handle this? We say that the husband repeats the acceptance and says, "I accept," and the first one is annulled. But if he remains as he was initially, the contract is not valid.
He said, may Allah have mercy on him, "And if it is delayed after the offer, it is valid". But someone might say that this is a tautology: if the acceptance is delayed after the offer, it is valid. We say that the author, may Allah have mercy on him, did not intend to tell us that the acceptance is valid if it is delayed after the offer. Rather, he said this as a preamble to what follows, which is his statement: "As long as they remain in the assembly and do not engage in what breaks it". Otherwise, it is well known that if it is delayed, it is valid, and there is no doubt about that. This is not a matter of the sky being above us and the earth below us. Rather, he said that as a preamble to what comes after, which is his statement: "As long as they remain in the assembly", meaning even if a long time passes, "and they do not engage in what breaks it". Now, what if they separate? He says, if they separate.
The questioner : It is not valid.
The Shaykh : How do we handle this? We say that the husband repeats the acceptance and says, "I accept," and the first one is annulled. But if he remains as he was initially, the contract is not valid.
He said, may Allah have mercy on him, "And if it is delayed after the offer, it is valid". But someone might say that this is a tautology: if the acceptance is delayed after the offer, it is valid. We say that the author, may Allah have mercy on him, did not intend to tell us that the acceptance is valid if it is delayed after the offer. Rather, he said this as a preamble to what follows, which is his statement: "As long as they remain in the assembly and do not engage in what breaks it". Otherwise, it is well known that if it is delayed, it is valid, and there is no doubt about that. This is not a matter of the sky being above us and the earth below us. Rather, he said that as a preamble to what comes after, which is his statement: "As long as they remain in the assembly", meaning even if a long time passes, "and they do not engage in what breaks it". Now, what if they separate? He says, if they separate.