Islamic Fiqh > Oaths and vows > The oath's kaffara in practice: feeding, clothing or fasting > The expiation of the oath: detailed rules
Contents
Updated on 27 September 2026 at 3:52 AM
The sheets of this chapter go through, point by point, the detailed rules of the oath expiation as the four schools debate them: value given in place of food and clothing, the expiation performed for another without his permission, giving the expiation to relatives, the description of the clothing that suffices and combining feeding some with clothing others, advancing the expiation before the oath is violated, the amount of food required for each poor person, the amount of clothing, and the case of one poor person fed for ten days in a row.
Each opinion is reported as the sheet assigns it, school by school and scholar by scholar, with the verses, the hadiths cited with their attribution and the works referenced at the end of each point.
The Hanafites and the Hanbalites hold that the person bound by the expiation may feed some of the ten poor and clothe some of them: Allah has given a choice between feeding and clothing to the one who owes the expiation, so the whole matter goes back to his choice among the ten.
The jurists differ on a further point: may the equivalent value, that is money, be given in place of the food or the clothing?
The Hanafites hold that value is permitted for clothing as for feeding. The purpose is that the poor obtain benefit from this amount of wealth, and that benefit comes as much through value as through food and clothing; since giving value is valid in zakat by the reports and by consideration, the same follows in the expiation, because no one has distinguished between the two cases. It is even correct to say of someone who hands another dirhams to buy what he will eat and wear: he has fed him and clothed him. If that wording is freely used, the phrasing of the verse covers it: the true nature of feeding is to make the food available so that the poor man eats it. If he gives it to him in ownership and the poor man does not eat it but sells it, it counts: the purpose is met, this amount of wealth reached him, even though he did not benefit through eating. The same applies if he gives him a garment he does not wear and he sells it. It follows that the purpose is not the act of eating or dressing itself, but that this amount of wealth reach the poor man: dirhams, clothes and food then share one ruling.
The Hanafites add: the Prophet fixed the zakat of the fast breaking at half a sa' of wheat or a sa' of dates or barley, then said: "enrich them this day of begging". He thereby states that the purpose is to free them from begging, not the quantity of food as such: and that relief comes through value as through food.
The majority of the jurists, the Malikites, the Shafi'ites and the Hanbalites, hold that value does not count, neither for feeding nor for clothing, by the word of Allah:
feeding ten poor persons from the average of what you feed your families, or clothing them
Surah al-Ma'ida, 89
The verse is explicit about food as such and clothing as such: the expiation does not come about otherwise, because the ordered duty is not performed. Allah gave a choice between three things; if value were allowed, the choice would no longer be restricted to three. And if value were intended, the choice would lose meaning: if the value of the food equals the value of the clothing, the two are one thing, how to choose between them? If the value of one exceeds that of the other, how to choose between them?
The counter answer to the Hanafi reasoning adds: if he gives in clothing the equivalent of the required food, it should count, but that contradicts the verse; likewise if the value of food rises until half a mudd equals the clothing of one poor man, half a mudd should count, and that again contradicts the verse. Only what the text mentions is required, like manumission, and value does not enter it. On this basis, even multiples of the value of the food do not count: the duty is not performed and the person does not leave his charge.
The sheet opens on the end of the previous debate: two narrations differ on the order of the Prophet's words, one making it appear that the expiation is allowed before the violation of the oath, the other that it comes after; the second cause of the disagreement is whether a due right can be discharged before its time falls, since the expiation, apparently, only becomes due after the violation, like zakat after the year. One saying holds that the expiation only becomes due with the will to violate and the resolve to do so, like the zihar expiation, and the disagreement then disappears from that side: whoever holds the expiation to prevent the violation allows advancing it, whoever holds it to remove the violation allows it only after the violation takes place.
The jurists then differ on someone who performs an expiation of an oath, or another, on behalf of another person without his permission: does it count for him?
The Malikites, on the famous view, hold that it counts to perform the expiation for him, with his order or without it. Imam Bukhari has a chapter on the man who slaughters a cow for his wives without their order, and cites 'Amra bint 'Abd al-Rahman from 'Aisha: we went out with the Messenger of Allah while five days of Dhul-Qa'da remained, intending only hajj; nearing Mecca, he ordered whoever had no sacrificial animal to perform tawaf and sa'i and then leave ihram; on the day of slaughter she came in and found meat of a cow; she asked what it was and was told:
It is the sacrifice of the Messenger of Allah on behalf of his wives.
narrated by al-Bukhari (1623)
Ibn Battaal quotes al-Muhallab: this hadith contains a rule of fiqh: whoever performs for another an expiation of an oath, of zihar or of killing, or offers a gift in his place, or pays a debt in his place, without his order, all of it counts for him; the Prophet's wives did not know of the cows he slaughtered for them for the obligations of the tamattu' pilgrimage. This is proof for Ibn al-Qasim, who holds that freeing a slave on behalf of another in the zihar expiation counts for him; al-Ashhab and Ibn al-Mawwaz refused it, holding that he does not free on his behalf without his knowledge, because it is a duty upon him; the argument of this hadith applies against them and against the jurists who follow their view.
The majority of the jurists, the Hanafites, the Shafi'ites and the Hanbalites, and al-Ashhab among the Malikites according to Ibn 'Abd al-Barr, hold that if he performs it with his order it is allowed, but that without his order it does not count: there is no intention of expiation in that expiation; the expiation is a duty performed only with intention, intention is a condition in it, and the absence of permission prevents the intention from being valid. What the deputy produced then falls upon himself.
Ibn Qudama raises the question: may the one who expiates give the expiation to his relatives, among those to whom his zakat may be given? He reports the view of al-Shafi'i and Abu Thawr, who allow it with no known opponent: the expiation is a right in property owed to Allah, so it follows the ruling of zakat regarding the relatives who may receive it and those who may not, a matter already covered in the chapter of zakat.
The detail follows: whoever is barred from zakat, the rich, the disbeliever, the slave, is barred from taking the expiation. The Banu Hashim remain: two views. The first: they are barred because it is an obligatory alms, and they are barred from alms by the Prophet's word: "alms are not lawful for us", and by analogy with zakat. The second: they are not barred, because this expiation does not become due by the foundation of the legislation itself, which makes it resemble voluntary alms.
The Hanbalites describe the clothing that suffices: it is what prayer is valid with. For a man, a garment even if old, as long as it holds; if it is worn out and its weakness can no longer keep it in place, it does not count because it is defective. A shirt counts if the obligatory prayer can be performed in it by placing some of it on his shoulders after covering his 'awra, or two pieces with which he wraps himself in one and wears the other as a cloak; a waist wrap alone or trousers alone do not count, because the obligatory prayer is not valid in them. For a woman, a dir', that is a shirt, and a khimar, with which her prayer is valid; less than that does not count for the wearer, she would be called naked in prayer. If the one expiating gives her a wide garment that can cover her body and her head, it counts, resting on the covering of her 'awra. He may clothe them from every category of clothing that may be worn: cotton, linen, wool, hair, camel hair, fur and silk, dyed or not, raw or cut, by the generality of the verse.
The jurists differ on combining within the oath expiation by feeding five poor and clothing five poor: is it allowed? The Malikites, the Shafi'ites and the Hanbalites on one view hold that combining does not count: feeding and clothing are two types of expiation, and the expiation is not discharged from both at once, just as freeing half a slave and feeding five poor does not count.
The people of knowledge agree that violating the oath before taking out the expiation is allowed, by the Prophet's word:
Whoever swears an oath, then sees something better, let him do what is better, and let him expiate his oath.
narrated by Muslim (1650)
Ibn 'Abd al-Barr writes: they agree that violating before expiating is permitted and good, and it is in their view the more preferred course. Qadi 'Iyad sees in it the argument of the Companions, the Successors and the scholars of the regions for the permission to violate before the expiation. Al-Qurtubi notes: after this agreement on the permission to violate before the expiation, the scholars differ on advancing the expiation before the violation: does it count? Al-Nawawi reports: they agree that the expiation is not due upon him before the violation, that delaying it after the violation is allowed, and that performing it before the oath itself is not allowed.
The jurists therefore hold three views on advancing the expiation before the violation.
The first view: that of the Malikites on the famous position, of the Hanbalites in the madhhab and of most of the people of knowledge; it is the madhhab of fourteen Companions: advancing the expiation before the violation is allowed. It rests on what Muslim reports from 'Abd al-Rahman ibn Samura:
O 'Abd al-Rahman ibn Samura, if you swear an oath and then see something better, expiate your oath and do what is better.
narrated by Muslim (1652)
And on the Prophet's word:
I do not swear an oath but that, if I see something better, I expiate my oath and do what is better, or I do what is better and expiate my oath.
narrated by al-Bukhari (6249, 6340) and Muslim (1649)
That is proof of the choice given. The Prophet expiated his oath after contracting it, so it is as if he should expiate after the violation; the expiation is a meaning that lifts the ruling of the oath, so its ruling does not depend on the violation, which is only its exemption; the expiation is stronger than the exemption, since it lifts the oath attached to a request as well as the free-standing oath. The oath is the cause of the expiation, by the word of Allah: "such is the expiation of your oaths when you have sworn"; He linked the expiation to the oath, and meanings are linked to their causes. The expiation is moreover a substitute for righteousness, so advancing it before the violation is allowed.
The second view: that of the Hanafites, and of Malik in the narration of Ashhab: advancing the expiation before the violation is not allowed. It is a right in property attached to a cause among the rights of Allah, so it cannot be advanced before its time, like the other expiations; he has not violated, so the expiation has no ruling, as if he took it out before the oath; the violation is what makes it due, so it is not taken from anything other than its cause. The expiation covers the transgression, and there is no transgression before the violation, because it depends on it, not on the oath: it is having mentioned Allah in a manner of veneration.
The third view: that of the Shafi'ites: the expiation may be advanced before the violation through feeding, clothing and manumission, but not through fasting, because fasting is bodily worship that cannot be advanced before its time, like prayer and the fast of Ramadan; as for expiating with property, advancing it is allowed like advancing zakat. Al-Shafi'i writes in al-Umm: whoever swore and then wants to violate, I prefer that he does not expiate until he violates; if he expiates before the violation with feeding, I hope it counts for him; if he expiates with fasting before the violation, it does not count for him. Allah has upon the servants a right in their bodies and their properties: the right upon their properties discharges them if advanced before its place, by the Prophet's taking the zakat of the year in advance from al-'Abbas before its time, and the Muslims' paying the zakat of the fast breaking before the breaking; as for acts of the body, they count only at their times: prayer counts only after its time, fasting only in its time or made up after it, and the hajj performed before the obligation does not discharge adult or child from the hajj of Islam, because they performed the hajj before it became due upon them.
Ibn Rushd summarizes: when does the expiation lift the violation, and how much of it? Al-Shafi'i holds that whether one expiates after it or before it, the sin is lifted; Abu Hanifa holds that the violation is lifted only by the expiation that comes after it, not before; both views are narrated from Malik. The disagreement has two causes: the first is the differing narration of the Prophet's word, one group narrating: let him do what is better, then let him expiate, and another group: let him expiate, then let him do what is better.
Before the amount, the schools set a rule: the Malikites, the Shafi'ites and the Hanbalites in one narration hold that continuity is not required in the fasting of the expiation: the command to fast is absolute and is restricted only by evidence; he fasted the three days without continuity being required, like the three days of the tamattu' pilgrim; and the Companion's report was only relied on because it was taken as Quran: when that status falls, its consideration falls entirely.
The jurists differ on the quantity that suffices for each poor person each day: half a sa' or a sa' according to the Hanafites, a Hashimi mudd according to the Malikites, a mudd with the Prophet's mudd according to the Shafi'ites and the Hanbalites, or an amount not fixed in the Law that goes back to custom according to Ibn Taymiyya and Ibn al-Qayyim.
The Hanafites hold that the duty is to give out, for each poor person, half a sa' of wheat or a sa' of dates or barley, by 'Umar's instruction to Yasir ibn Numayr:
I swear that I will give nothing to a people, then it seems better to me and I do it; when you see me act so, feed ten poor persons for me, each of them half a sa' of wheat or a sa' of dates or barley.
narrated by Ibn Abi Shayba in al-Musannaf (12194), 'Abd al-Razzaq in his Musannaf (16075), al-Tahawi in Sharh Ma'ani al-Athar (3/121) and al-Bayhaqi in al-Sunan al-Kubra (19763)
The same is reported from 'Ali. He may give out its value, but only for the quantities not specified by the text; the specified quantities may not be paid in value if they are less than the fixed measure, even if their value equals or exceeds it: half a sa' of good dates worth half a sa' of wheat does not count, nor less than half a sa' of wheat worth a sa' of dates or barley, because no genus specified by the text substitutes for another specified genus, however much more it is worth: the consideration of the text does not bear on what it specifies, but on what lies outside it. Wheat bran and split dates or split barley may be given, the purpose being met since the genus is one. Feeding them at noon and at night is allowed, whether they ate little or much: the text aims at feeding, that is enabling to eat and permitting it, as in conferring ownership. A weaned child does not count among those fed at night, because he does not eat a full meal; barley bread needs a condiment to reach fullness, wheat bread does not. What counts in enabling to eat is two filling meals: lunch and dinner, or two lunches, or two dinners, for each poor person, the consideration being the need of the day. Feeding five at noon and five others at night is not allowed; he must then feed one of the two groups a second filling meal.
The Malikites hold that the expiation of the oath is transferring into ownership to ten free Muslim poor, even if minors, giving each of them a mudd of the average food of the household measured with the Prophet's mudd, no less, or two ritl of dates, raisins or meat; satisfying them twice, like lunch and dinner in one day or more, counts.
The Shafi'ites hold that the discharge is to hand to each poor person a mudd of a grain of the kind of the fitr, taken from the predominant food of the country of the one expiating, saying: "take it, or eat it, or I permit it to you". If he gathers the ten and feeds them at noon and at night, it does not count: the duty is to hand over the grain, which he did not do; it is not certain either that each one ate his full right, so he doubts having removed the obligation from himself, and the default is its persistence.
The Hanbalites hold that the duty, in the amount of food of all the expiations, is a mudd of wheat for each poor person, or half a sa' of dates or barley, by what al-Athram reports from Abu Hurayra about the man who had intercourse in a day of Ramadan: a basket ('araq) of dates holding fifteen sa' was brought, and the Prophet said: "take it and give it as charity"; what is established in the case of intercourse in Ramadan by the report is established in the other cases by analogy, and obligatory feeding does not vary with the types of discharges, like the fitr and the fidya of intercourse. Imam Ahmad reports the Prophet's word to the muhallil about a woman of Banu Bayada who came with half a wasq of barley:
Feed him this, for two mudd of barley stand in place of a mudd of wheat.
narrated by al-Bayhaqi in al-Sunan al-Kubra (7/392)
Ibn Qudama writes that this is a text, and that it proves the mudd is of wheat: it is the view of Zayd, Ibn 'Abbas, Ibn 'Umar and Abu Hurayra, with no known opponent among the Companions, which amounts to consensus; and that half a sa' of dates and barley follows from what 'Ata' ibn Yasar reports: the Messenger of Allah said to Khawla, the wife of 'Aws ibn Thabit: go to so-and-so of the Ansar, he has half a wasq of dates he intends to give as charity, take it and give it as charity on his behalf to sixty poor persons; in the hadith of 'Aws, the Prophet says: I will help him with a basket of dates, go and feed sixty poor persons with it and return to your cousin; and Abu Dawud reports from Abu Salama ibn 'Abd al-Rahman that the basket holds fifteen sa': two baskets make thirty sa', half a sa' for each poor person; since the expiation combines fasting and feeding, each poor person has half a sa' of dates or barley, like the fidya of intercourse in Ramadan.
Al-Buhuti specifies: what is given out in the expiation is what suffices in the fitr: wheat, barley, their flours, their sawiq, dates, raisins and dry cheese; if the food of his country is other, like corn, millet or rice, it may not be given out, because the report came with these categories in the fitr, and the other does not suffice as if it were not his food; Abu al-Khattab, al-Muwaffaq and others chose that it suffices, by the word of Allah: "from the average of what you feed your families"; giving out the grain is best, leaving disagreement, and it is the state of completeness: grain is stored and ready for all its benefits, unlike the rest. Ibn Hani' is reported as saying: dates and flour are most beloved to me. In al-Targhib: dates are most pleasing to Ahmad; that accords with what precedes about the fitr. Flour may be given out, but the mudd is increased by the amount that restores a mudd of grain in it, or it is given out by weight of an Iraqi ritl and a third, because the grain, being milled, scatters its parts: the measure of flour holds more than the measure of grain. Bread does not count: it has left measure and storage, it resembles harisa. The Qadi and his companions, among them al-Kharqi, preferred permission; al-Mughni states that bread counting is better, by the word of Allah: it is part of the average of what he feeds his family, and storage is not the goal of the expiation: it is measured by what feeds the poor man in his day, and bread is ready for the usual eating; harisa, however, has left the usual eating for the realm of condiments. Less than a mudd of wheat does not count, nor less than two mudd of dates, barley, raisins or dry cheese, nor less than two Iraqi ritl of wheat bread, for usually that does not reach a mudd; nor less than four Iraqi ritl of barley bread, if one holds that bread counts; provided it is known that this equals a mudd of wheat or two mudd of barley; adding a condiment to the qualifying amount is recommended, stated in explicit text.
Ibn Taymiyya and Ibn al-Qayyim hold that the duty goes back to custom and is not fixed in the Law. Ibn Taymiyya writes in Majmu' al-Fatawa: when he finds the means he expiates with one of the three; if not, he fasts three days. The amount to feed rests on two views among the scholars: one, that it is fixed by the Law, in three forms: a sa' of dates or a sa' of barley or half a sa' of wheat for each poor person, by Abu Hanifa and a group; half a sa' of dates and barley or a quarter of a sa' of wheat, that is a mudd, by Ahmad and a group; or a mudd of everything, by al-Shafi'i and a group. The second: the amount is fixed by custom, not by the Law; he feeds the people of each country from the average of what they feed their families, in amount and kind; that is the meaning of Malik's view: Isma'il ibn Ishaq reports that Malik held, in the oath expiation, that the mudd sufficed in Medina, and Malik adds: the countries have a life other than ours; I hold that they expiate by the average of their life, by the word of Allah: "from the average of what you feed your families"; it is the madhhab of Dawud and his companions without restriction, and it is the view reported from most of the Companions and Successors: they said the average is bread and milk, bread and ghee, bread and dates; the highest is bread and meat. Ibn Taymiyya judges this the correct view, by the Book, the Sunna and consideration, and it is the analogy of Ahmad's madhhab and its principles: what the Lawgiver did not fix goes back to custom; Ahmad does not fix the food of the wife, the child or the slave, nor the wage of the hired worker fed and clothed, nor obligatory hospitality, nor the hospitality owed by condition to the People of the Book, nor in his two more famous narrations the jizya or the kharaj, nor obligatory foods in general, whether they become due by the Law or by condition: the food of the expiation deserves all the more not to be fixed. The categories are three: what has a limit in the Law or in language goes back to them; what has neither goes back to custom.
Ibn al-Qayyim adds, in Zad al-Ma'ad: what the Quran and the Sunna indicate is that the duty in the expiations is feeding only, not transferring ownership: in the oath expiation, "its expiation is feeding ten poor persons"; in that of zihar, "whoever cannot: feeding sixty poor persons"; in the fidya of pilgrimage, "then a compensation of fasting, alms or sacrifice"; and the Quran, in the feedings of the expiations, contains nothing else: no place fixes a mudd or a ritl. The Sunna confirms it: the Prophet said to the man who had intercourse in a day of Ramadan: "feed sixty poor persons", and said the same to the muhallil, without fixing a mudd or a ritl. No one below Allah, His Messenger and the consensus of the umma is proof, and Allah ordered our disputes referred to Him and to His Messenger. He suspended the command on the verbal noun, feeding, without fixing the kind or amount of food, but He fixed the kind of those fed and their number: the food is left absolute, the fed are restricted. Wherever feeding a poor person is mentioned in His Book, the customary known feeding is meant: in Surah al-Balad, the steep path is freeing a slave, or feeding on a day of hunger an orphan; in Surah al-Insan: they feed the food, despite their love of it, to a poor person, an orphan and a captive. It is known with certainty that they would have been praised had they fed them at noon or at night, bread and meat, or bread and broth: Allah turned from the food, the name of what is eaten, to feeding, the verbal noun, proof that feeding the poor without transferring ownership fulfills the command; in every language and custom it is said that he fed them. Anas said the Prophet fed the Companions at Zaynab's wedding feast bread and meat, and about Safiyya's: he fed them hays. Whoever fixed the food of the family only took it from fixing the food of the expiation, against the text: Allah left the food of the family absolute and made it the root of the food of the expiation; no Companion is known to have fixed the food of a wife, despite the universality of the incident.
The jurists differ on the amount of clothing required.
The Hanafites hold that he must clothe ten poor persons, giving each of them a garment or more; the minimum is what prayer is valid with. For a man, a single garment suffices; for a woman, he must add to it a khimar, because her head is 'awra and prayer is not valid with it uncovered. One garment given to ten poor persons and worth ten garments does not count; if its value equals the feeding of ten poor persons, it serves instead for the feeding.
The Malikites hold that clothing counts only if prayer is valid with it: for a man, a garment covering his whole body down to the heel or near it, not a waist wrap and a turban; for a woman, a dyed dir' and a khimar. If he clothes them with other than the average clothing of the people of his locality, it suffices: the aim is covering, not adornment. The suckling infant is like the grown person: he is given what the grown person is given of clothing, and what covers him alone does not suffice; another view holds that the child is considered in himself and given a garment of his own size.
The Shafi'ites hold that if he wants to expiate with clothing, he clothes ten poor persons with what bears the name of clothing: a shirt, a turban, trousers, a cloak, a waist wrap, a miqna', the woman's covering garment, the qina' being what the woman covers her head with, or a khimar. The Law came with clothing absolute, with no custom to attach it to, so it is carried to what bears its name, and that name applies to the turban, the miqna', the khimar and the trousers, which count like the shirt. Do not count: the sock, the gloves, the covered shoe, the sandal, the belt, the helmet, and anything not called clothing, like an iron armor; fur and lubad count if the country customarily wears them; the tabban, short trousers not reaching the knee, does not count, nor the ring, the tikka, the 'irqiyya. Suitability for the recipient is not required: a child's trousers for an adult who cannot wear them count; cotton, linen, silk, hair and woven wool each count for a woman and for a man, because the name of clothing applies to them, provided their strength has not gone; if reduced to powder, they do not count; besides keeping their strength, they must not be torn; a new garment with loose weaving does not count if its wear lasts only as long as that of a worn garment, for the weakness of the benefit it gives; a garment impure in its very substance is not given, a stained one counts but he must inform the poor of its impurity; a washed garment is allowed as long as it remains usable. Being returnable in a sale does not affect its purpose, like the defect that does not impair work in a slave. It is recommended that the garment be new, raw or cut, by the word of Allah: "you will never attain righteousness until you spend from what you love". One long garment given to ten does not count for them, unlike if he cuts it into pieces and then hands it to them.
The jurists of the umma agree that if he feeds one poor person each day until he completes the ten, it counts: the duty is feeding ten poor persons and he fed ten. They differ, on the other hand, on one poor person fed for ten days.
The Hanafites hold that it counts if he gives him two filling meals each day: the purpose is covering the needy person's want, and that want renews each day, so giving him on the second day is like giving to another. The same holds if he gives him, for ten days, each day half a sa' of wheat or a sa' of dates or barley. If he gives him in a single day the food of ten days, it counts for that day only: the distribution is required by the text, "feeding ten poor persons", and it did not happen in reality or by estimation, like the pilgrim who throws the seven pebbles all at once. If he feeds twenty poor persons at once, he must feed one of the two groups a second filling meal; the same if he feeds ten at noon and ten others at night.
The majority of the jurists, the Malikites, the Shafi'ites and the Hanbalites, hold that it does not count: it is a departure from the Messenger of Allah's plain command, and the name of ten poor persons does not at all apply to one poor person.
Ibn Qudama treats the question in al-Mughni: whoever finds only one poor person repeats on him the remainder of the ten days. The summary: the one expiating either finds the poor persons in full number or does not; if he finds them, feeding fewer than ten does not count for the oath expiation, nor fewer than sixty for that of zihar and for the expiation of intercourse in Ramadan; al-Shafi'i and Abu Thawr say so; al-Awza'i allowed giving it to one person; Abu 'Ubayd holds that if he restricts it to a household in severe need, it counts: the Prophet said to the man who had intercourse in Ramadan, who told him of the severity of his need and his family's: "feed them to your family"; he gave Allah's right to one of the people of entitlement, like the one who gives his zakat to a single person. The people of opinion hold that it may be repeated on one poor person over ten days if it is an oath expiation, or over sixty if the duty is feeding sixty poor persons, but it may not be given to him in one day; Abu al-Khattab narrated this from Ahmad; each day he fed a poor person what is due to the poor person, as if he had given it to another. The counter argument: Allah made his expiation the feeding of ten poor persons; whoever feeds only one has not fed ten and has not complied with the command; he has not brought the expiation; one to whom the giving is not allowed on the first day is not allowed it on the second in an unchanged situation, like the child; as for the man who eats his own expiation, Allah lifted it from him for his incapacity: there is no disagreement that a person does not eat the expiation of his own person nor feed it to his dependents, though he was commanded to do so.
There remains the incapacity to find all ten: he repeats on those of them present each day until ten days complete; if he finds only one, he repeats on him the remainder of ten days; if he finds two, he repeats on them five days; al-Thawri said the like, and it is the choice of most of the companions; another narration from Ahmad holds that only the full number counts, which is the madhhab of Malik and al-Shafi'i as mentioned in the case of ability. Ibn Qudama argues: repeating the feeding over ten days is equivalent in meaning to feeding ten: he covers the want over ten days as if he fed one poor person each day; the equivalent takes the place of the thing when it becomes impossible, which is why substitutes were legislated to stand in for the replaced ones in meaning; they do not suffice when the replaced ones are available, as here. The question was treated in detail in the book of zihar.
In practice: feeding ten distinct poor persons, giving each the average food of his own household, one day per poor person, remains the safest path; if poor persons are hard to find, the schools that allow it permit repeating on the same one until the number completes; the expiation may be advanced before the violation of the oath through feeding, but not through fasting according to the Shafi'ites; payment in money only counts for the Hanafites; the measures (mudd, sa', ritl) differ from one school to another, and the food of the country weighs more than the exact figure: consulting a competent scholar remains the safest course for specific cases.