Am I obligated to offer expiation, and can I take my wife to the market before Eid, after having said to her: "By triple divorce, I will not take you to the market until after Eid"?

The majority of scholars hold that a divorce oath results in divorce upon the occurrence of the sworn-upon condition, and that uttering the triple divorce pronouncement counts as three divorces. This is the fatwa we adhere to. Accordingly, if you violate your oath and take your wife to the market before Eid, she will be triply divorced from you, resulting in an irrevocable divorce (baynunah kubra).

In contrast, Shaykh al-Islam Ibn Taymiyyah is of the view that the ruling on a divorce oath, when its intention is not to effect a divorce but rather to threaten or emphasize, is that of an oath (yameen). Thus, if the sworn-upon condition occurs, the swearer must offer expiation for an oath (kaffarat yameen), and no divorce takes place.

We advise refraining from swearing by divorce due to established prohibitions against it, and because it is considered an oath of the morally corrupt (ayman al-fussaq).