The Nature of the Forbidden Breastfeedings

Question: We seek your guidance regarding a man whose maternal grandfather’s wife (his father’s mother) breastfed him eight years after her pregnancy and childbirth had ended, and milk came for him. Is the aforementioned breastfeeding considered valid? And is he forbidden from marrying his paternal aunt’s daughters (his father’s sister from the same father), who are from a woman other than the aforementioned grandmother?

Answer: If milk came for him, and the aforementioned breastfeeding was lawful; that is, five breastfeedings while the infant was within the first two years, and the nature of a single breastfeeding is: that the infant holds the breast and sucks the milk, then releases it. If he returns and holds it a second time, sucks the milk, and releases it, it becomes a second breastfeeding, and so on until the five are completed. In that case, the aforementioned man has become a brother to the children of the aforementioned grandmother from her husband (his grandfather) and her other husbands, and a brother to the children of his grandfather from the aforementioned grandmother and her other wives. Consequently, it is not permissible for him to marry the daughters of the aforementioned paternal aunt; because through this breastfeeding, he has become their maternal uncle through breastfeeding. And the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) said: .