What is the ruling if the child is not mentioned during the Li'an proceedings?

General Chapter

Al-Mughni

Book of Mutual Imprecation (Li'an)

Book 43 · Issue 5 · Bab 1

Open in Qurani

Primary text

If the child is not mentioned in the Li'an, paternity is not negated from the husband. If he intends to negate paternity, he must repeat the Li'an and include the negation of the child within it.

Supporting text

The opposing view argues that negating the child in the Li'an is sufficient, as if both phrases were mentioned. They view the insistence on extra phrasing as an unsupported assertion, and combining one phrase with the other does not necessarily remove ambiguity if the husband believes the act was illicit intercourse or if he means the child physically resembles neither him nor his lineage.