The ruling on telling one’s wife she is “like my sister”

Question

Question: Mr Sultan informed his wife Sughra in writing, writing and sending her: “If you come on 6 November 1967 in the evening before sunset, you are my wife; if you come after it has passed, you are like my sister; and if you let this time pass, then you have my talaq.” The wife did not go to her husband at the appointed time and stayed on at her mother’s house. When Sughra came to her parents, she was six months pregnant, and now five months have passed since the child was born.

Answer

If by the words (“like a sister”) he intended zihar (likening one’s wife to a woman permanently unlawful to him), then zihar has occurred; if he intended talaq, then an irrevocable (ba’in) talaq has taken effect, because this expression is among the allusive expressions (kinayat) of zihar, and in it the intention (niyya)

Source: Fatawa Mahmudiyya

Preview. The full text opens with JavaScript enabled.