44وَخُذ بِيَدِكَ ضِغثًا فَاضرِب بِهِ وَلا تَحنَث ۗ إِنّا وَجَدناهُ صابِرًا ۚ نِعمَ العَبدُ ۖ إِنَّهُ أَوّابٌAli Unal(We also told him): “Take in your hand a bundle of rushes and strike with it: do not break your oath.”1 Surely, We found him full of patience and constancy. How excellent a servant! He was surely one ever-turning to God in penitence.While he was ill, the Prophet Job, upon him be peace, swore by God that if God would restore him to health, he would punish his wife with lashes because she had committed an error. God revealed to him that he could fulfill his vow by striking her with a bundle of (as many) rushes (as the amount of the lashes with which he swore to punish her). There is such a rule in the Sharī’ah: should the culprit be so ill that there is no reasonable chance of recovery, or if he or she is too old, he or she should be hit only once with a branch with as many twigs as the amount of the lashes with which the culprit should be punished, or with a broom with the same number of straws, so as to meet the formal requirements of the Law.