thus pronounced was annulled by him (Ah.I, p. 265). Another report shows that, until the time of ‘Umar, people used to pronounce three divorces together, but that these counted as a single divorce (Ah.I, p. 314). ‘Umar, in order to restrain people from such an un-Islāmic procedure, ordered three divorces given at one time to be reckoned as three separate acts of divorce, taking place at intervals, but this order had the opposite effect to that intended. It became a general practice to pronounce divorce three times on one occasion, and this was supposed to have the effect of three separate acts of divorce, thus making a revocable divorce irrevocable. This is really a negation of the very principle underlying the institution of divorce in Islām. It is true that divorce is allowed, but as it disturbs the normal family relations, it is looked upon with dis-favour and is permitted only in extreme cases when the carrying on of marital obligations by the husband or the wife becomes impossible. But even after this extreme step has been taken, not only are the parties still free to resume conjugal relations within the waiting period, or to remarry after that period has expired, but they are actually encouraged to do so. The two forms of divorce, called bid‘ī and ḥasan, take away the freedom to reunite which the Holy Qur’ān has conferred upon the two parties, and they are therefore against the teachings of the Holy Qur’ān and must be discarded. The revocable divorce of the Holy Qur’ān cannot be made irrevocable as, by this change, a death-blow is dealt to the beneficial spirit underlying the institution of divorce in Islām. Hence whether divorce is pronounced once or thrice or a hundred times during one waiting period, it is only a single divorce, and it is revocable during that period.
It is clear from what has been stated that irrevocable divorce is the very rarest of things that can happen among Muslims, and it can only occur if the two un-Quranic forms of divorce, to make revocable divorces irrevocable, are brought in. When a man and a woman have found by two experiments that they cannot live together as husband and wife, it is absurd on their part to think of remarriage again. Hence the Holy Qur’ān lays down that they shall not remarry after