The first: I know that he did not have intercourse with her. It is not permissible for him to marry her, because he acknowledges for himself the prohibition of her. If he returns and gives the lie to himself, saying: "I have come to know of her truthfulness," he is held accountable in what is between him and Allah Almighty, because lawfulness and prohibition are among the rights of Allah Almighty. Once her lawfulness to him is known, she does not become prohibited by his [previous] lie. This is the school of al-Shafi'i, and [it is based on] the fact that he may come to know what he did not know before. If he says: "I do not know whether he had intercourse with her," she does not become prohibited to him by this, because what is considered for her lawfulness to him is a report that leads to a dominant belief in her truthfulness, not the reality of knowledge.

Section: If he divorces her with a revocable (raj'i) divorce, goes away, and she completes her waiting period and wishes to marry, and his agent says: "Wait, in case he has revoked the divorce against you," it is not obligatory for her to wait. This is because the original status is the absence of a revocation and the lawfulness of marriage, so it is not obligatory to depart from that due to something doubtful. Furthermore, if it were obligatory for her to wait in this situation, it would have been obligatory for her to wait even before his statement, because the possibility of a revocation exists whether he speaks or does not speak. This would lead to the prohibition of marriage for every revocable divorcee whose husband has been absent from her, forever.

Section: If she says: "I have married someone who had intercourse with me," and then she retracts that before he concludes the contract with her, the contract is not permissible, because the report that permitted the contract has ceased, and thus the permissibility has ceased. If it is after he has contracted with her, it is not accepted, because that is an invalidation of the contract that became binding upon her through her own statement, and thus it is not accepted, just as if he claimed the marriage of a woman and she acknowledged it for him, then retracted her acknowledgement.