Is the oath sworn by a person when he is angry valid?
- According to some religious scholars, an oath sworn in anger is regarded as an ineffective oath (yamin laghw) and it is null and void. Their evidence is the following hadith: "Oaths sworn in anger are null and void." (Muslim)
- However, it is narrated in Bukhari and Muslim that the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) swore an oath when he was angry not to give any mounts to Asharis but that he gave them mounts afterwards and paid atonement for breaking his oath.
- Those two hadiths contradict each other. Which one is fabricated? There are some fabricated hadiths among kutub as-sittah, which shook my confidence in the sunnah a little. I wanted to ask you.
Submitted by on Mon, 03/03/2025 - 19:54
Dear Brother / Sister,
According to a narration, Asharis wanted a mount from the Prophet (pbuh). The Messenger of Allah said, "By Allah, I will not allow you to ride a mount; there is no mount with me that I can make you ride." said. However, later on, some camels obtained as booty were brought to the Prophet. Thereupon, the Prophet asked, “Where are Asharis?” When we went to the Prophet, he ordered some camels from the booty to given to us.
We said, "O Messenger of Allah! We asked mounts from you before but you swore that you would not give us any mounts. Have you forgotten it?" He said, "I have not made you mount the camels now; Allah has done it. Doubtlessly if I swear an oath - by Allah's permission - and see something better than it, I will definitely do that better deed and pay atonement for the oath.” (Buhari, al-Khumus, 15; Muslim, h.no: 4354)
- There is no expression that the Messenger of Allah (pbuh) was "angry" in this narration of the hadith (Bukhari and Muslim). However, in another narration by Bukhari and Muslim, it is stated that Asharis went to the Messenger of Allah "at a time when he was angry".
- As far as we can see, there is nothing related to "ineffective oath" in this hadith narration - whether there was anger or not.
Ineffective oath is an oath sworn by mistake or with the thought of something being true. For example: If a person who is in debt says, "By Allah, I have paid my debt" thinking that he has paid his debt though he has not paid, it is an ineffective oath and hence there is no need for atonement.
Likewise, an oath that is accidentally sworn out of will without the intention of oath is such an oath and no atonement is necessary.
- We could not find any information in the explanations of the hadith that this oath was an ineffective oath due to anger. (see Nawawi, al-Minhaj, Ibn Hajar, Fathul-Bari, the explanation of the hadith in question)
- We could not find any information in Muslim that the Prophet (pbuh) did not pay atonement for the oath he swore out of anger. However, there are several sound hadith narrations, mainly in Bukhari and Muslim, like the following:
“If a person swears an oath about a deed and then sees something better than it, he should break his oath, do that good deed and pay atonement for breaking his oath.”
- We could not find any information in Islamic fiqh sources that an oath with the element of "anger" was an ineffective oath and that there was no atonement for it.
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