As the story goes, a woman’s husband comes to her stating his desire to marry a widow —wanting her husband to herself and her family as is, she refuses and he does not go through with the marriage. Time passes, her husband dies, and she becomes a widow. A married man offers to marry her and care for her and her children, but alas, his wife refuses and he doesn’t go through with the marriage.
What we are supposed to learn from this story is that women should be careful not to refuse their husband’s desire to be polygamous, lest they find themselves in a similar situation. While I understand the value some may find in such an anecdote I think it can do more harm than good. It is acceptable in Islam for a man to marry up to four women; those women can be young, old, widowed, previously married, never married, etc. The idea that a woman must have a sob story in order to consider polygamy only further ‘otherizes’ this acceptable form of marriage.
It also gives women a false sense of power. The woman who refuses to accept her husband marrying another wife does not have to power to do so. She can stay or she can divorce him but she can’t deny him the ability to marry another woman. If a man doesn’t marry a second wife —for several reasons including his current wife’s feelings, it is his decision. His wife can heavily influence his decision but she cannot make it for him.
Marriages not working out can have several influences, this story (unintentionally, I think) pits two women against each other for a decision that is solely up to the man. Only he can decide to be polygamous or not, if the story went the opposite route and the first wife was ecstatic about her husband marrying another woman, she could not force him to do so. Even women coming into a marriage for the perceived “benefits of polygamy” should realize that they have no control over whether or not their husband remains polygamous.
A part of the stress women feel concerning polygamy is the undue control we attempt to exert over an area in which we have no control. That’s not to say women who don’t want their husbands to be polygamous should silence themselves but rather recognize where their control lies and where it does not. And women hoping to marry a man but being “stopped” by his current wife, should recognize that ultimately it was his decision —not hers, the blame, guilt, and whatever other negative feelings you may harbor should not be directed towards the other woman.
Each woman, all women —as well as men, are simply trying to make the best decisions for their own marital life. Perhaps the (potential) incoming wife comes with a sob story to pull on the current wife’s heartstrings, perhaps she doesn’t. Perhaps the current wife will regret persuading her husband not to marry again, perhaps she won’t. Either way, the attempts to defend polygamy, in some ways do it a disservice, polygamy doesn’t need to be defended any more than marriage itself. It doesn’t become more justified if a man wants to marry a single mother than if he wants to marry a virgin bride. And both types of women are just as eligible for monogamy as they are for polygamy. The idea that polygamy is justified via ‘woe is me’ stories only adds to the idea that polygamy needs to be justified at all, and it doesn’t.
Photo by Ali Karimiboroujeni on Unsplash
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To Note: Many scholars believe polygamy to be impractical in modern Western society while others believe it is becoming more necessary, this post isn’t meant to be a part of that specific discussion but rather reflect on one aspect of this form of marriage that I found worthwhile to discuss. Because of the nature of this post, I’ve included a few more notes below, and here’s a link to a more critical post I wrote on polygamy some time back. Lastly, after writing this post I came across this thoughtful discussion on the topic and this interesting article sharing a similar view to my post, and now, on to the notes:
Note 1: If we look at an example of two of the prophet’s wives —Khadijah and Aisha, Allah be pleased with them, judging by our standards Khadijah would be more “suitable” for polygamy (previously married with children) and Aisha would be more “suitable” for monogamy (young, never married), and yet the opposite is the case. There are no ‘types’ of women that are more suitable for either form of marriage. It is of course noble to marry widows and help care for their children, but we see the prophet, peace to him, do this in both monogamy and polygamy.
Note 2: When we talk about ‘power’ here we are talking about legal power granted by the shariah. That is of course not the only kind of power, likely a woman with a solid relationship with her husband has a lot of power of influence over his life decisions. Her ease or discomfort with polygamy will likely be the most important factor in his decision to marry again or not.
Note 3: While any woman can enter into —or rather, accept a polygamous marriage I do recognize that it seems —at least in the Western Muslim context, to be most acceptable to women who are older, widowed, divorced, and/or single mothers. I think this is precisely in part because polygamy is so socially unacceptable; women feel they need an excuse i.e. a ‘sob story’ before considering this form of marriage. They feel the need to be in a state (widowed, divorced, etc.) where others will view them with sympathy instead of disdain. And Allahualim.
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