The Problem of Customary Marriage and the Solution of Temporary Marriage

• Main Author: Seyyed Abolhasan Navvab
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: University of Religions and Denominations 2020-09-01
• Series: Religious Inquiries
• Subjects: marriage; temporary marriage; customary marriage; mutʿa; emergency
• Online Access: http://ri.urd.ac.ir/article_113827_f6c9a5cc9570b266f3b7c012b9e57f6e.pdf

Customary marriage (nikāḥ ‘urfī)—non-official married life of a couple—is a new phenomenon increasingly spreading throughout the Arab world. Legal and social consequences of customary marriage have led many socio-jurisprudential scholars to forbid all its varieties. The strategy has, nevertheless, failed to restrain the spread of this type of marriage. In this paper, I argue that one fundamental religiously acceptable solution is temporary marriage. Although Muslims have disagreed over the legitimacy of temporary marriage, I argue that they all agree over its original legitimacy according to the Quran and Hadith, and then I show that there is no decisive evidence for the subsequent abrogation of its legitimacy. Moreover, I argue that temporary marriage can serve the purposes of customary marriage. Thus, all Muslims can accept temporary marriage as a religious replacement for customary marriage.