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What is incumbent upon me regarding the difficult and arduous vows I made while suffering from severe obsessive-compulsive disorder (waswas), and must I fulfill them, or can I expiate them as an oath?

1 min readAlso available in العربية

A person afflicted with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) is not held accountable for any words or actions that result from the compulsion of the waswas (whispers/suggestions of Shaytan), because they are in a state akin to being coerced. Therefore, if the desire to make a vow did not stem from free choice, but was rather an overwhelming urge due to waswas, then the vow is not valid, and there is nothing binding on the person suffering from waswas.

Summarized from the full answer at Ftawy · reviewed Sep 2, 2026

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