Validity of conditional divorce
9-7-2016 | IslamWeb
Question:
Is there any clear proof in the Quran or the Sunnah for conditional divorce? And is the incident of Layla bint Al-ʻAjmaa' valid or is that a myth? If it is valid, then why we are doing somtething that makes the devil happy? Why do we not go towards Allaah, given that Allaah hates divorce? I think that this is the best fatwa; that the conditional divorce is only a vow necessitating an expiation, and that it is not a divorce.
Answer:
All perfect praise be to Allaah, The Lord of the worlds. I testify that there is none worthy of worship except Allaah and that Muhammad 
is His slave and Messenger.
Firstly, we would like to point out that the evidence supportive of any religious ruling is not confined to the texts of the Quran and the Sunnah. If there are no texts from the Quran or the Sunnah and there are statements of the Companions 
then their statements are used as evidence by scholars and are given precedence over Qiyaas (analogy). The Companions witnessed the descent of the divine revelation and accompanied the Prophet . They were endowed with the most perfect understanding of the divine revelation and were the most knowledgeable of the intended meanings of the speech of Allaah and His Messenger .
Ibn Al-Qayyim 
wrote about the kinds of praiseworthy opinion:
"The first kind is the opinion of the Companions, who were the most knowledgeable Muslims. They were endowed with the purest hearts, the most genuine characters, the most sincere intentions, the most perfect dispositions, and the clearest minds. They witnessed the descent of the revelation and understood the interpretation and intended meanings of the statements of the Messenger best. The status of their opinions and knowledge of the Sunnah of the Messenger is as close as the status of their companionship to him." [Iʻlaam Al-Muwaqqiʻeen]
There are no explicit texts in the Quran or Sunnah pertaining to conditional divorce. Therefore, Muslim scholars brought forth a number of statements and reports on the authority of the Companions as supportive evidence in this regard. Had there been texts in the Quran or the Sunnah, then they would have cited them and would not have settled for citing the reports of the Companions. Some of these reports are authentic, and some are weak. An example of the authentic reports is the Muʻallaq report (i.e. a hadeeth missing link in the chain of narration, reported directly from the Prophet ) cited by Al-Bukhari in the affirmative form of transmission on the authority of Naafi' . It reads, "A man said to his wife, 'If you leave the house, you are divorced.' When Ibn ʻUmar was asked about it, he said, 'If she leaves the house, then she is divorced; and if she does not leave, then nothing happens.'" This report is one of the strongest pieces of evidence about the conditional divorce proving that once the thing on which the divorce is conditioned takes place, divorce takes effect. Ibn Taymiyyah and his student Ibn Al-Qayyim 
and those who adopted their scholarly view interpreted this report to pertain to the case in which the husband holds the intention of divorce, not of an oath (Yameen).
ʻAbd Ar-Razzaaq cited a report on the authority of Ibraaheem At-Taymi, who narrated on the authority of Bakr ibn ʻAbdullaah Al-Muzani that he said:
"Abu Raafiʻ (the slave of Layla bint Al-ʻAjmaa') told me, 'My lady, Layla bint Al-ʻAjmaa' said to me, 'If you do not divorce your wife, every slave owned by me is (to be) freed, every item of wealth owned by me is (to be) offered in charity, and I am (to be) considered a Jew or Christian!' Layla bint Al-ʻAjmaa' and her slave went to Zaynab, the daughter of Umm Salamah (who was known for her profound knowledge of Fiqh) to seek her fatwa, and she exclaimed, 'Are you following the example of Haroot and Maroot!' Layla bint Al-ʻAjmaa' responded, 'May Allaah make me your ransom!' Zaynab 
replied, 'She said that she would be a Jew or Christian! Fear Allaah and pay expiation from your right hand and leave the man and his wife alone...''" The report also mentions that he went to Hafsah and ʻAbdullaah ibn ʻUmar and that they gave the same answer as Zaynab.
Ibn Al-Qayyim mentioned that this report has other chains of narration indicating that it was not reported on the authority of At-Taymi only. Ibn Taymiyyah and Ibn Al-Qayyim relied on this report to support their view that conditional divorce does not take effect if it was uttered merely with the intention of making an oath. They drew an analogy between the divorce and the manumission and charity mentioned, which did not take effect when the thing on which they were conditioned took place; rather, it was only an idle oath.
Each party supported its view with many pieces of evidence; there is no room to cite all of them here. It should be noted that this matter falls under the category of religious matters open for Ijtihaad (scholarly reasoning). When a Muslim scholar believes a certain view to be the most correct in this regard and advises people to follow it, then he has done his duty. Saʻeed ibn Jubayr said, "The one who acted according to what he had heard has acted rightly." [Al-Bukhari]
It is not correct to say that the scholars who held that the conditional divorce takes effect in all cases, regardless of whether the thing on which it is conditioned takes place or not, seek to facilitate divorce, break up marriage bonds, or please Satan! Rather, they have exerted commendable intellectual efforts to reach the scholarly view that they believed to be the closest to the truth in this regard, as stated above.
For more benefit, please refer to fataawa 85415 and 87786.
Allaah knows best.