1170 - Issue: He said: "If a slave converts to Islam, and he has under him two wives with whom he has consummated, and they both convert during the waiting period, they remain his wives. If there are more than that, he chooses two from among them."

The entirety of this matter is that the ruling for a slave regarding what exceeds two is the ruling for a free man regarding what exceeds four. So, if he converts and he has two wives under him, and they both convert along with him or during their waiting period, their marriage is binding, whether they are both free women, both slave women, or one free woman and one slave woman, because he is permitted to combine them at the inception of his marriage, and thus it is the same in his choice. If there are more than that, he chooses two from among them, whichever he wishes, according to what has previously been stated regarding the free man. If he had two free women and two slave women under him, he may choose the two free women, or the two slave women, or one free woman and one slave woman. The free woman does not have the option of separation if she converts along with him, because she consented to his marriage while he was a slave, his slavery did not renew upon conversion to Islam, nor did her freedom renew because of it; therefore, she has no choice, just as if she married someone with a defect, knowing of the defect, and then they both converted. Al-Qadi mentioned a position that she does have the option because slavery is a defect whose rulings were renewed by Islam, so it is as if it were an emergent defect. The first (opinion) is more correct; for slavery does not cease to be a defect and a deficiency in the view of the rational, and its deficiency is not renewed by Islam, so it is like all other defects.

Section: If he converts and he has four free women under him, then he is manumitted, and then they convert during their waiting period, or they convert before him, then he is manumitted, and then he converts, the marriage of the four is binding upon him because he is among those for whom four is permissible at the time of their collective conversion to Islam, as he is free. However, if they all convert, and then he is manumitted before he chooses, he may not choose except two, because he was a slave at the time when the choice was established for him, which is the state of their gathering upon Islam; thus, the change of his state after that does not change the ruling, just like one who converts while he has slave women under him, and they convert along with him, and then