Ruling on considering zihar to be a divorce

Question:
It was said in *Subul al-Salam*: If a man makes zihar intending divorce, it is zihar; and if he pronounces divorce intending zihar, it is divorce. Is this correct? And how do you reconcile this with ?

Answer:
Allah made zihar zihar because the people of the pre-Islamic age of ignorance (jahiliyyah) used to treat it as a divorce. So Allah ruled that zihar is zihar involving prohibition, and He specified the expiation (kaffarah) in His Noble Book. Therefore, it is not treated as a divorce. If he says, "You are to me as the back of my mother," or "as the back of my sister," or "my daughter," it is zihar, even if he intended it to be a divorce. In fact, it is zihar, as Allah legislated, in opposition to the practices of the jahiliyyah. Allah has invalidated the practices of the jahiliyyah, so it carries the ruling of zihar, and the expiation is upon him. The expiation is: freeing a slave. If he is unable to do so, he fasts for two consecutive months. If he is unable to do that, he feeds sixty poor people before he touches her.
As for if he says, "You are divorced," and intends zihar, it does not become zihar. Because this is what is said in response to zihar. "You are divorced" is an explicit formula of divorce, so it does not shift from the explicit formula of divorce to another meaning.