O Prophet, meaning [to address] his community, on account of what follows; or, [it means] say to them: when you [men] divorce women, when you intend to [effect a] divorce, divorce them by their prescribed period, at the beginning of it, such that the divorce is effected while she is pure and has not been touched [sexually], based on the Prophet’s (s) explaining it in this way, [as] reported by the two Shaykhs [al-Bukhārī and Muslim]. And count the prescribed period, keep record of it, so that you may repeal [your decision] before it is concluded; and fear God your Lord, obey Him in His commands and prohibitions. Do not expel them from their houses, nor let them go forth, from them until their prescribed period is concluded, unless they commit a blatant [act of] indecency, [such as] adultery (read mubayyana or mubayyina, corresponding [respectively] to buyyinat, ‘one that has been proven’, and bayyina, ‘blatant’), in which case they are brought out in order to carry out the [prescribed] legal punishment against them. And those, mentioned [stipulations], are God’s bounds; and whoever transgresses the bounds of God has verily wronged his soul. You never know: it may be that God will bring something new to pass afterwards, [after] the divorce, [such as] a retraction, in the event that it was the first or second [declaration of divorce].