Dowry and Mahr
In the initial era of Islam marriage would have been a simple affair, without pomp or ceremony. Any expenditure incurred rolling around in its performance was quite minimal, and never a burden on either family. Indeed, the Prophet stated: ‘the most blessed marriage is but one in that your marriage partners put the least burden on the other person.’ (al-Haythami, Kitab ab-Nikah, 4:255).
Nowadays, too many problems and hardship could be caused through the setting and giving of dowries, bride-prices and mahr – as well as enormous wedding feasts and celebrations in certain cultures which bring a most unreasonable financial burden about the families concerned. Financially disable celebrations are totally from the spirit of Islam, and they are not necessary. They are purely just a few the culture of certain regions. No Muslim should feel obliged to remain these unIslamic traditions, or perhaps embarrassed about breaking using old cultural traditions.
It is critical that Muslims themselves know that there is a massive difference between dowry, bride-price and mahr. Many books and articles within the subject confusingly utilize word dowry to mean mahr, but in fact the proper word for dowry is jahaz, and its particular function is very different.
What is really a dowry in Islam?
The custom of giving dowry (jahaz) is just not part of Islam, even though it actually seems to be within the increase among several Muslim cultures, notably the ones from Indian, Pakistani and Bangladeshi origin, regardless of whether they have settled inside the UK. In fact, it is usually a practice which includes never been sanctioned by Islam and is just not prevalent amongst Muslims of other cultures. It appears to be in imitation of ancient Hindu culture by which daughters are not given any portion of the family property, but received payments, component of which might be available as household goods, like a measure of compensation. Islam granted daughters a rightful be associated with their family property and inheritance.
A ‘bride-price’ is either : · some money, goods or possessions provided to the bride by their bride-to-be’s family during her marriage, to be able to attract an excellent husband on her behalf. It would in place become the property in the husband or his family upon his marrying her. This can be a totally unIslamic practice. In Islam, women are certainly not ‘owned’ by their loved ones and should cease ‘traded with’ in this fashion. It is an insulting practice. Or · an accumulation money demanded from your bridegroom or his family by bride or her family, usually their bride-to-be’s father, without that the daughter will ‘t be given in marriage. In the jahiliyyah society before Islam, this money was viewed as the property from the girl’s guardian.
The matters of fathers giving their bride-to-be gifts of cash or property, or spending money on an enormous wedding feast, or providing your house, or setting her up in their own home with furniture and household effects remain to the discretion on the people linked to Islam. The Prophet himself saw for the marriages of his four daughters. He gave his daughter Fatimah various gifts when she married Ali b. Abu Talib, but there’s no record of his having given everything to his other daughters for the occasion in their marriages. Had such gifts been a suggested sunnah, he’d surely have due to the others gifts likewise. Moreover, the gifts presented to Fatimah were extremely modest household articles – a sheet, a leather water-bag, and also a pillow full of grass and fiber.
Nothing are often more unIslamic than ostentation. It is ridiculous to try and justify flamboyant displays of wealth in lavish gifts or feastings by citing the Prophet’s extremely modest gifts to Fatimah.
What would be the Mahr in Islam?
The mahr is usually a compulsory a part of an Islamic marriage contract. The other words for mahr generally utilized in the Qur’an are sadaqah and ajr, meaning reward or gift to your bride where there is profit but no loss, and faridah, literally that that’s been made obligatory, or perhaps appointed portion. Allah commanded: ‘Give women their faridah as being a free gift.’ (4:4) (Unfortunately your message is frequently incorrectly translated as ‘dowry).
It can be a gift of income, possessions or property made through the husband to your wife, which becomes her personal property. It is an admission of her liberty, for she becomes the owner with the money or property immediately, though she could possibly have owned nothing before. It has absolutely nothing to do with either with their parents, with the exception that a husband ought to take a loan. This should basically be done with the purpose of repayment. It is also intended like a token from the husband’s willing acceptance with the responsibility of bearing all of the necessary expenses of his wife.
Even when the wife owned no property or money of her before her marriage, she actually is given this money or property when she marries in order that she commences her married life in her own new status with money or property of her. The wife gives herself and her services to her husband, plus return he gives her property to have herself, even when she had nothing before, and pledges which he will maintain her. Muslim women they fit in charge with the internal arrangement with the household, while Muslim these are responsible for its financing (even if your wife earns her money following her marriage).
The Prophet gave everyone of his wives a payment of mahr, starting from token sums, the granting of freedom from slavery when being designed a wife, for the payment of 400-500 dirhams. His wife Umm Habibah’s mahr was made up of 4000 dirhams, this sum previously being fixed by Najashi, the Negus of Abyssinia (a Christian ruler). (Abu Dawud, Kitab an-Nikah, 2:235).
There was a student in fact no fixed upper limit for mahr. Allah required the availability to depend on the circumstances with the husband:
‘…the wealthy as outlined by his means, and also the straitened in circumstances based on his means. The gift of any reasonable amount is required from people that wish to act correctly.’ (2:236).
In a famous case, your second Caliph, Umar b. al-Khattab, once gave a public sermon during which he asked the congregation to keep from fixing heavy mahrs, and stated that this Prophet had declared no-one should give greater than 400 dirhams. A woman immediately stood up and challenged him, quoting the verse 4:20 on the Qur’an: ‘But if you decide to go on a wife rather than another, even though you had given the very first a heap of gold (quintar) to get a dowry, you shall not take in any respect back.’ Umar went back towards the minbar and withdrew his words stating ‘the woman is correct, and Umar is wrong. Whoever wishes may give the maximum amount of property because he desire to give.’ (Ibn Hajar al-Athqalani, Fath al-Bari, 9:167).
Who owns the mahr? Can it be refused?
It is owned solely from the wife. The husband will not be allowed to don’t pay his wife an effective mahr or faridah. The settling in the payment is obligatory.
‘Women are lawful to you….so long as you take them in marriage instead of fornication. As to those through that you profit (through marriage), allow them to have their faridah as appointed.’ (2:24).
The same applied when marrying Jewish or Christian women (5:5). If a Muslim man married someone ‘whom his right hand possessed’ (ie a slave or prisoner of war), the mahr would have been to grant her freedom along with other payment hasn’t been required.
Caliph Umar ruled when a woman had excused her husband his mahr, but later demanded it, the husband ought to be compelled to spend it for the grounds which the fact that they demanded it became a clear proof she had not remit it of her very own free will.
The case of any woman whose husband died before fixing the amount from the dowry or consummating wedding was delivered to Abdullah b. Mas’ud. He ruled that she ought to be paid according on the mahr of ladies of like status to herself.
The Shafi ‘I school rules which a wife may usually consummate the marriage if your husband agreed to repay the mahr immediately, but didn’t do so. She might have the marriage annulled.
How much should the Dowry amount be in Islam?
It is unIslamic for just a Muslim woman setting a huge need for herself, with the goal of deterring suitors of humble means. Islam does not need husbands and wives to come from your same social strata or income brackets – evidently this may often appear to be advisable. Islamic compatibility will be based upon religious faith and mutual respect, but not on money, caste (another Hindu tradition), class, background, tribe, etc.
It is equally as unIslamic to demand an enormous mahr, generally past the husband’s means, based for the intention of checking the husband from ill-treating his wife, or causelessly or wrongfully divorcing the wife, or preventing him from remarrying another later – the reasoning being that within the of divorce at least 18 can demand the whole payment in the mahr. The fixing of any substantial mahr with the above purposes rests about the supposition which the mahr really needs to be fixed during the time of marriage, and not handed over until divorce – giving it a supposed ‘deterrent’ value. This is unlawful in Islam, for in cases like this the wife doesn’t have any use or ownership in the mahr during the time on the marriage.
If the mark husband is just not a wealthy man, a generous wife might want to accept tiny mahr, but it is to be her very own free choice. She should stop coerced or have pressure place on her by any means. Some from the Prophet’s female companions accepted their husbands’ conversions to Islam, or memorising of ayat with the Qur’an, or giving education to others because their mahr.
The mahr needs to be fixed taking into consideration the bridegroom’s position in everyday life. That is, it should not normally be a lot more than he is easily capable of afford, if a single payment or some piece of value. Jurists have different opinion of what the minimum amount needs to be, but all agree that it ought to be substantial enough for something being bought against it. In other words, any amount which can be sufficient for any purchase is acceptable as mahr.
The husband could possibly be loaned money by his father or family, nevertheless it must be repaid. In the situation of Nabi Musa (the Prophet Musa “Moses“), when he left Egypt for Madyan he married Safura the daughter with the Prophet Shu’ayb. His mahr mu’ajjal was settled and repaid by binding himself to grazing his father-in-law’s cattle for 10 years without payment. probably Shu’ayb had paid Safura on Musa’s behalf.
A good woman might acknowledge a low mahr if she wishes, or none by any means, according on the circumstances of her husband. Once fixed it really is fixed, and legally binding – so it’s good practice to obtain it written down and witnessed using a document. The wife should take tips on her decision, rather than be blinded by emotion, or coercion, or fear, or family pressure. If anybody pressurises a female into a decision she mightn’t have otherwise made, see your face will be held to account inside the Life to Come, regardless of whether he ‘got away with it’ within this earth.
One recorded hadith shows that ‘the best woman could be the one whose mahr would be the easiest to spend.’ (al-Haythami, Kitab an-Nikah 4:281).
However, it truly is sensible for the wife to simply accept a reasonable mahr, simply because this becomes her property mentionened above previously, and is particularly hers to hold should wedding ceremony fail and result in divorce.
Under what conditions would it be payable?
There are two main choice for properly presenting mahr to the bride to be.
The first strategy is to hand it over in full before marriage, by which case it really is known as mahr (Dowry) mu’ajjal, or ‘promptly given mahr (Dowry)’. (Notice the ‘ . The word hails from ‘ajilah, meaning ‘without delay’. This was the accepted perform during the time on the Prophet, along with the amount fixed was generally quite minimal.
In the way it is of Fatimah and Ali, Ali informed the Prophet which he had not give her. The Prophet reminded him of your coat of chain-mail he previously had been given. It was still in their possession, although within a dilapidated condition and worth under four dirhams. The Prophet Muhammad suggested he gave that to Fatimah, and also this was done.
The second technique of presenting mahr is always to defer it, at hand it over to bride after a certain time frame, the time period of which need to be specified, fixed with the man and agreed because of the wife. This really needs to be settled, with witnesses, during the marriage. This form of mahr is referred to as mahr muwajjal. (the phrase implies ‘inside a period of time’).
The five major schools of Islamic law all agree that delay in handing within the mahr, whether 100 % or in part, is lawful provided that this fixed period for payment just isn’t indefinite.
This method will not be used for an excuse to willfully postpone the payment. A definite date should invariably be fixed, witnessed, and followed. It should certainly not left ‘hanging’ in case wedding breaks down as well as the couple visit consider a divorce – because in the inevitable emotions, arguments, bitterness, hostilities and financial problems involved then.
If the husband died, or they got divorced, the mahr debt need to be paid up immediately to your widow before his inheritance or any other financial settlements are viewed. It is her property, but not his.
Repayment of Mahr in the event of khul divorce.
A khul divorce is certainly one in which a wife sues for divorce while the husband hasn’t driven her with it by his unreasonable behavior.
If there may be no good reason for just a wife desiring to divorce her husband, but it is often a case through which she simply desires to finish wedding ceremony with no particular legal grounds up against the husband, the husband may accept to grant her the divorce if she returns all or a part of the mahr. This really needs to be agreed bewteen barefoot and shoes.
If the wife has genuine grounds for divorce – for example cruelty, mental cruelty, breaking in the marriage contract, desertion, adultery, incurable insanity, long-term imprisonment, abandonment of Islam – then a divorce will not be khul but an average talaq, the place that the wife has as often right to instigate proceedings because the husband. In these cases, she undoubtedly does not have handy over any from the mahr.
If the wife has genuine grounds for divorce even so the husband refuses the divorce, she will then approach lawyers for khul, and appoint an Imam to act for my child. It is sensible to do this likewise as having a UK lawyer. She isn’t required to pay for back any one her mahr. Indeed, the lawyers may demand some additional compensation for my child if the husband is guilty. (She might have to prove his guilt, and will gather the maximum amount of evidence beforehand as she’ll – for instance signed and witnessed statements of witnesses, photographs of injuries sustained, i.e).
(islamawareness.net)