Iyas (despair; the end of menstruation through age and its effect on the waiting period, clothing and divorce; and the prohibition of despairing of God's mercy)

Iyas is lexically the cutting off of hope and desire, and the jurists use it in two senses: the end of menstruation through age, and the cutting off of hope in a thing. ¹²

• Qu'ud: the end of a woman's menstruation and childbearing; a woman in this state is called qa'ida, pl. qawa'id. ²
• 'Aqr and 'aqm: barrenness; a barren woman may still menstruate, which distinguishes her from a woman past menstruation. ²

• The age is disputed: fifty, or fifty-five for the Hanafis, sixty, the age of the women of her family in one Shafi'i view, and a distinction between Arab and non-Arab women in some reports. ⁵
• The Malikis and Hanbalis have a least and a greatest age: fifty at least, seventy at most for the Malikis and sixty for Ahmad, with what lies between treated as doubtful. ⁵³
• Blood after the age is not menstruation in the prevailing Hanafi view; a cessation caused by illness or suckling does not count as iyas until the age is reached. ⁵⁴
• The Hanafis require a long cessation, six months in the sounder view, before iyas is declared. ³

• Her waiting period after divorce is three months, on the Qur'anic text in sura al-Talaq (65:4). ³
• The sunna form of divorce for her, for the Hanafis, is one pronouncement at the start of each month. ³
• She is licensed to put off her outer garment without display, on sura al-Nur (24:60). ⁴

• Despair of provision, of forgiveness or of God's mercy is forbidden; the scholars count it among the grave sins, on sura Yusuf (12:87) and sura al-Hijr (15:56). ⁴⁶
• The repentance of one who despairs of life, like a dying person, is refused by the majority, while some Hanafis distinguish his repentance from his faith. ⁶

Sheikh Omar Abdelkafy treats despair as a disease of the heart. He lists it with envy, pride, showing off and vanity, as things that spoil the believer's heart, and includes despair of God's mercy. ⁷ He presents the question of a woman who sins, then prays and fasts, yet despairs and feels that her worship is not accepted, and who asks how to be free of this. ⁸

The Sheikh holds that despair does not befit a believer. He says that one whose prayer is not answered after a few attempts does not despair, and does not think that his sins or God's will block the answer. ⁹ He says that when hardships grow, relief is near, and that despair is not a quality of the believer. ¹⁰ He explains that repentance rests on giving up the sin, on regret, and on the resolve not to return to it. If the sin overcomes one again, he returns to forgiveness and does not despair, and he warns against the whisper of Satan that repentance does no good. ¹¹ He cites a hadith that treats regret over a sin as repentance itself, and says that a sin is removed as soon as one regrets it. ¹²

The Sheikh explains hasra linguistically as scraping the covering off a thing until its surface is bare. ¹³ He says that when the covering of faith is stripped from the soul, the soul is left exposed to every harm, and that untreated regret turns into despair and the loss of hope. ^{14 15} He describes dismay as leading to hasra, and cites a verse about people's deeds appearing to them as regret (needs_source: the verse's location is not given in the recording). ¹⁶

The Sheikh cites a Qur'anic passage about a person who loses a blessing after receiving it, and becomes despairing and ungrateful; he holds that untreated despair leads to constriction. ¹⁷ He says that a person who takes God's gifts, such as children, faith, provision and standing, as lost and despairs becomes ungrateful. ¹⁸ He says that untreated despair narrows the chest, so that a person ignores God's signs in the sky, in the air and in health. ¹⁹ He says that someone who loses trust in a thing becomes hopeless, while the believer who prays stands in God's presence. ²⁰

The Sheikh refers to what Sura Ya-Sin says about regret over lives wasted in worry and grief (needs_source: the verse's location is not given in the recording), and says that a brighter tomorrow is to be expected once worry is put down. ²¹ He says that one should not despair of guiding anyone, even a disbeliever, and that a person should count his sins as he counts debts, and repent of them. ²² He says that untreated despair turns into kamad, a disease whose remedy he will set out in its place. ²³