The ruling on the words “if I sleep with you, then I do haram”

Question

As part of a course of treatment, doctors forbade a man marital relations, saying that for there to be at least some benefit he should not have relations for forty days. To keep himself from relations, this man said to his wife: “اگر میں تجھ سے ہم بستری چالیس دن سے پہلے کروں تو حرام کروں” (“If I sleep with you before forty days, then I do haram”), and he said these words several times.

Answer

The man who said to his wife, “If I sleep with you before forty days, then I do haram,” and after that had relations before forty days, is obliged to make the expiation for an oath (kaffara). It is this: to feed ten poor people to their fill twice a day, or to give them clothes to wear; if he is not able to do that, to keep three fasts consecutively.

Source: Fatawa Mahmudiyya

Preview. The full text opens with JavaScript enabled.