“Permitted to you on the nights of fasting is intimacy with your wives” (al-Baqarah 2:187).
Some reports portray this permission as repealing an earlier stringent practice, including abstention after sleep. The critical question is whether that practice had been established as a binding earlier legal command or represented an existing custom or understanding among the community.
Clarifying lawful nighttime conduct need not technically abrogate an earlier Qur’anic ruling unless such a ruling and its subsequent removal are demonstrated. The verse must be read together with the nature of the earlier practice.