Abdul-Rahman Murphy of Practimate on Muslim men’s attitude to polygamy and the distress it causes sisters, who often find themselves reluctant to marry:
As my wife and I discussed this odd phenomenon of young, practicing, Muslim singles remaining single, I asked the stereotypically male question, “Why are there so many unmarried people here? You would think that with such a large quantity of actively-Muslim Muslims that there would be a high percentage of brothers and sisters that were hitched.”
My wife shrugged, “Not sure, and it’s not like they don’t want to get married, a lot of the sisters I’ve met are looking for a husband.” And then it dawned on me – the apple had dropped from Isaac’s tree and struck me on the head, pulling to the forefront of my mind, an amazing idea: “Why don’t the brothers and sisters here who are unmarried just marry each other!” It was so simple! I was on my way to becoming the matchmaker of the century, and had already began imagining my acceptance speech as the new president of Practimate.com.
“Pfft,” she said.
“Pfft? Is that such a terrible idea? We have two groups of unmarried people here, is it so hard to imagine that there would be some marriage-matches amongst them?”
“It’s possible – if the guys act like men.”
Whoa! Where was this coming from? The brothers I’d met during my time at the conference were, masha Allah, rising stars of dawah in America. The level of knowledge that was to be seen on the Y-chromosome side of the classroom was admirable, and I felt lucky to be a part of the group. Surely, brothers who were actively racing towards gaining knowledge from their teachers had passed the proverbial gate of maturation into manhood!
“Act like men? Huh?”
“The sisters would be interested, if they noticed any guys who would act mature. The main complaint I’m hearing on the girls’ side is that the guys aren’t acting like candidates that the girls would be interested in. For example, today when the shaykh mentioned the phrase ‘second wife’, the brothers started giggling and high-fiving like…boys! Just watch for the next couple of days and tell me what you think.”
More from me on the matter of polygamy here, but it’s depressing how the brothers can’t understand how disturbed sisters are at their joking on polygamy. (More: Ginny.)
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All joking aside. The serious problems are those brothers who actively are looking for a second wife without their wife’s knowledge. It breaks homes, relationships and shatters kids dreams.
I am in agreement with muslim gal, who posted on your previous post. But when looking at this quote “the brothers started giggling and high-fiving like…boys”, should the “boys” part be highlighted, and it’s simply just “boys being boys”? Men and women might make the odd sexist joke when in company of friends of the same sex, but it doesn’t mean they are genuinely sexist (for example). I mean I’ve certainly been in the company of other muslim men, and jokingly this topic has come up. However I would never consider having two wives. So maybe sisters shouldn’t worry too much about men acting like kids sometimes. Ultimately marriage is a risk, and I certainly hope people don’t hold back because of fears like this. At the end of the day you just have to hope for the best. Or maybe I’m underestimating how often this happens because I don’t really socialise in these religious circles.
[…] September 30, 2009 Assalamu alaikum, there have been 2 recent posts (here and another related one here) on the topic of polygamy and sisters’ distress regarding this issue. And of course, along […]
In this day and age, with all the fitnah in the world, children need to have parents who are there to pay attention to them at all times. If a man has more than one wife, then that’s 2 or more households and sets of children to divide his time between in the increasingly SHRINKING amount of time that the average wage-earner has these days to devote to his family in the first place. So how much attention are the children getting from their father in these relationships? Probably not much. Bad idea.
I would like to add a different perspective that although I find very unpopular I would like to share. At the time of the prophet (saw) jealousy still existed and it exists today. Peopole still had children with their spouces and time was divided. We can not try and make something that is halaal seem so bad and ugly and try as hard as we can to shove it down mens throats that they are being unislamic by taking a second wife. Yes many men do not go about things in an islamic way when seeking a second wife but at the end of the day I think its because he knows his wife would never approve. I think we as muslims need to re-visit our whole view on love and if its really halal to love a man so much that you would divorce him for taking a second wife. The only love that should be so powerful that can destroy your life should be losing the love of Allah. I think that in this day and age we have been brainwashed into believing in a false hollywood love that is not islamic. If you really love your husband then your first priority will be helping him to make it to Jennahtul firdous and if he needs a second wife in this dunya to curb some desires whithin him then you should set your personal feelings aside and give him your blessing and set ground rules and make lots of dua. I am not in a p marriage and im not even married but I hope that I would react in this way if this would ever happen to me inshallah. May allah help us all
As Salaamu Alaikum..
First of all if you are a Muslim woman then you know or should know that our Husbands are a loan to us. Second ” It Is The Sunnah. Third, I will post it here for you to see that our Husbands DO NOT HAVE TO TELL us of his desire to marry again, nor does he need to tell us he is married again (though the day he starts staying away form home should be an indication) Praise be to Allah, the Lord of the Worlds; and blessings and peace be upon our Prophet Muhammad and upon all his Family and Companions. As for your question about the second wife - There is nothing in the Shari‘a (Islamic law) that proves the unlawfulness of a man marrying a second wife without the consent of his first. However, a group of scholars made it lawful for a woman to make it a condition for the man who proposes to marry her that he must not get married to any other woman as long as she is his wife. For these scholars, If the man accepts this condition he must fulfill it. Their evidence is the Hadith of Oqbata Ibn Amer (May Allah be pleased upon him) that Prophet Muhammad (Blessings and peace of Allah be upon him) said: “The most worthy conditions to be fulfilled by you (Muslim men) are the ones, which made the (women’s) vagina lawful to you. This is a sound Hadith narrated by al-Bukhari and others. But this condition is false and the man is not asked to fulfill it because it goes against the Quran which has made it lawful for the man to marry two, three or four women. Allah says: {…then marry women of your choice two or three or four}. [4:2]. And the Prophet Muhammad (Blessings and peace of Allah be upon him) said: “Whoever stipulates a condition that is not in the Book of Allah (i.e. Qur’an), it is considered false even if he stipulates a hundred conditions”. Narrated by both Muslim & Bukhari. And Allah knows best
So for all of you complaing… LEARN YOUR RELIGION !!!! Also it is POLYGONY IN ISLAM not Polgamy…..they mean different things !
Saafira:
Actually, the terms are polygamy and polygyny. The first means having multiple spouses; the second means multiple wives (actually, the ‘gyn’ bit means woman, not wife necessarily). Since polygyny is a form of polygamy and nobody ever said that polyandry (multiple male partners) is halaal, either term is acceptable. I fail to see why anyone makes a fuss over it.
I am in a polygynous marriage and I find the greatest hatred and misunderstanding towards polygyny unfortunately comes from other Muslims. I am a revert who prefers polygyny, as I love my own time and space, previously my husband when he wasn’t at work wanted to spend all that spare time with me; and he’d get quite upset if I wanted to use that time; which is the only time possible for me to go to sisters’ events or houses; as ‘me’ time. I also have a lot of interests such as dressmaking and even my own business on the side; that I just had no time to do anything with in monogamy. I really felt in monogamy I was losing myself. Polygyny is not easy on the man and if he enters into it for any reason other than fisabillillaah, he is going to be disappointed and mess things up. In polygyny a man has to spread himself, his finances and his time even more thinly than ever before. He has to take from his time and resources so he can be fair to both wives. If a man goes into polygyny knowing this and handles it well, then kudos to him. With regard to a man marrying a wife without his first wife’s knowledge, even if this is technically permissible in fiqh terms; the scholars have clearly said it is not from good manners to do this. Also think about it; after the initial event; if the brother decides to continue to keep it from his first wife or keep the fact he is already married from the second (and I heard recently of a brother who had three wives, none of whom knew about the other), it will involve lying to one or both of them at some stage, which is clearly haram. While certain white lies are permissible under straitened circumstances in Islam; this scenario involves a situation which was not necessary to begin with so I don’t think it would apply. Also if it comes later the brother had lied; it is far more likely one or even both marriages will not survive; whereas if the brother had been honest to begin with it is more than likely his wife or wives would have come round to the idea.