How does one expiate for intercourse during the days of Ramadan?

Question Summary

How does one expiate for intercourse during the days of Ramadan?

Answer

In the Name of Allah, the Most Merciful and Compassionate

Breaking one’s fast by eating, drinking, or sexual intercourse intentionally in the month of Ramadan, if one already intended from the night to fast that day, necessitates qada (makeup fasts) and kaffara (60 days of expiatory fasts). [Tahtawi/Shurunbulali Hashiyat Maraqi al-Falah]

The make-up fasts should be performed first, and it is recommended to follow them up with the expiatory fasts immediately. [Ibn ‘Abidin, Radd al-Muhtar]

The 60 expiatory fasts must be done in succession. Therefore one should time them so that no days that are prohibited to fast come within that time period. The prohibited days are the 2 days of ‘Eid and the 3 days following ‘Eid al-Adha.

The only exception to this is the days of a woman’s menstruation or post-natal bleeding, as it is unlikely for a woman to go sixty days without menstruation.

If one has repetitively broken their fast in Ramadan and has not performed the expiatory fasts for the first of those breakings – one set of expiatory fasts is sufficient, even if the prior breakings were from more than one Ramadan. This is according to Imam Muhammad (Allah has mercy on him), and this opinion is the relied upon position. [Tahtawi/Shurunbulali; Hashiyat Maraqi al-Falah citing Bazzaziyya, Mujtaba and others.]

If you have broken your Ramadan fast due to intercourse, you must perform the aforementioned expiation. If you commit the same sin again and break another fast before expiating for that fast, one expiation is sufficient. The principle is that one expiation suffices all the breaks that were not expiated for before it. [Tahtawi,Shurunbulali; Hashiyat Maraqi al-Falah]

Moving Forward

Due to your breaking multiple fasts in Ramadan, you must calculate, with reasonable surety, the number of days you did not fast and make them up. Thereafter you must fast sixty consecutive days, timing it that no prohibited days fall within that time. This will suffice you in your obligation to rectify your situation. [Shurunbulali, Maraqi al -Falah]

Hope this helps

And Allah knows best

[Shaykh] Yusuf Weltch

Checked and Approved by Shaykh Faraz Rabbani

Shaykh Yusuf Weltch is a teacher of Arabic, Islamic law, and spirituality. After accepting Islam in 2008, he then completed four years at the Darul Uloom seminary in New York, where he studied Arabic and the traditional sciences. He then traveled to Tarim, Yemen, where he stayed for three years studying in Dar Al-Mustafa under some of the greatest scholars of our time, including Habib Umar Bin Hafiz, Habib Kadhim al-Saqqaf, and Shaykh Umar al-Khatib. In Tarim, Shaykh Yusuf completed the memorization of the Qur’an and studied beliefs, legal methodology, hadith methodology, Qur’anic exegesis, Islamic history, and several texts on spirituality. He joined the SeekersGuidance faculty in the summer of 2019.