I am told under Islam only four marriages are permitted. And I believe that should mean anybody marrying more than four times should be a Kafir or not a muslim. How about your own prophet. Was he a true muslim?
In Islam four marriages are permitted at any particular time but there are certain condition for them. You can marry more if one or more of your wives die or get divorced. Becoming a non-muslim or kafir has nothing to do with marriage.
Dhir : You are trying to inquisitive by being blasphemous. Dont play these games dude, I could go postal on your religion but my religion, which is Islam, does not permit me to be that way.
Wasalaam
Zman,
I could go postal on your religion but my religion, which is Islam, does not permit me to be that way.
Why not? Is that written down somewhere? I know that we have to respect the rights of others to hold their beliefs, but if they are taking the pi*s then what's to stop us having a look at theirs?
Before you guys decide to rationalize your behaviour with another member's misguided acts, cut it out.
Anything can be discussed without any side being abusive. That's only if you want to learn/teach. If you are only interested in accusations and tit for tat behaviour, then just forget about it now and abandon this thread.
Hmmmmmmmmm dhir another cheap tactic to hurt islam? Is that all you got?
Islamic law regulated polygamy after it was abusive. Hence, while men used to get married to tens and evev hundreds of women during the pre-Islamic times, Islam limited this type of relationships to a maximum of four women, and set strict regulations in the way of all wives being treated equally. While you are
correct that at birth, there are approximately as many males and females born, the older they get, the more females live and their ratio becomes much higher than males. This is caused by many reasons including wars, diseases, accidents, and mainly because women naturally live longer than men. Hence, polygamy while not obligatory for Muslims, is
an excellent system to support women (and
children) financially and emotionally. Here is an example from the US Bureau of Census (1990) that can make it clearer for you. Please note that the United Nations figures of all of the countries of the world confirm the same conclusions: In the 1990 US census, there were 9.599 million boys born and 9.158 girls born. In the same year, there were 9.833 million men and 10.012 million women between the ages of 35 and 39. As to those between 60-64 years old, there were 4.946 million males and 5.678 females. As to those 85 years or older, there were 841 thousand males and 2.180 million females. The census also states that there were 91.963 million
males and 99.571 million females over 16 years, and there were 12.492 million males and 18.586 million females over 65 years. The Census also shows that among the people who were 75 years or older in the US, 53.2 percent of the females lived alone while only 20.8 percent of males lived alone. These
numbers clearly show that at all ages of marriage, there are more females than males. The numbers also show that the older a population gets, the higher the female ratio is to the males’ ratio, and it is usually at older ages that polygamous marriages take place. Hope this clarifies your inquiry.
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Thank you have a nice gupshup.
HARooN
HARooN>>>Chorr chori se jaye…haira-pehrii se na jaye<<< 
It is interesting to read the comments and see how closly at the surface one looks at the issue of 4 marriges in Islam. We talk about statistics, we talk about our personal views and give it a Quranic white wash to justify. Sadly with most of our view we fail to read between the lines. We quote Quran left and right to justify each and every foly we commit.
What we fail to understand and mostly ignour is the true understanding of Quran and its teaching. We like to take Quran as per its word which infact is not wrong, but at the same time one needs to look at other historic sources and within our selfs logically to understand what God and HIS Profit is trying to say. For that very reason our Profit (PBUH) said (and no body can deny) that to gain knowlege one (Man/Woman) should not hesitate to go to even China. Furthermore, he married a much OLDER DIVORCED BUSINESS WOMAN who dealt with every body (without hijab) on daily basis for her business concerns. If we look at only these two examples logically I think we can really put our selfs on the right track of true understanding of our religion as Islam and the status of woman in it. If he says that one has to strive for worldy knowlege and not only Quran for the sake of our exsistance in this world surely one can justify that Quran is like a doctrate course which contains all the answer to our exsistance in this world and the answers to our after life, and the way to qualify for this doctrate course one has to go to China to learn the worldy knowlege. Ofcourse it does not mean that one should study every thing else first and leave Quran for the last. God does not need people who all their lives study only and only Quran, He has Angels for that and we know that for a fact (from Quran) that human being is superior to all His creations including Angels and Gins. Not long ago it was commonly understood that earth is flat, is the center of universe and so on. Now we know scientifically and logically that none of it is true and so does Quran said 1400 years ago. This scientific proof infact helped our believe to more solid grounds than before. It is not our falt that He has given us the ability of questioning and justification. I am sure He knows what He is doing and we should be sure that certainly He does not want us to believe every thing without logic, infact giving us His book with imposible revelations 1400 years ago He wants us to prove beyound the shadow of dought His word and also appreciate His superiority to every living and non living things aroud us.
Now lets talk about woman and its position in Islam by keeping the clouse of 4 marriges and briefly her position in our society. When we talk about a muslim man marrying 4 times, I think this is one of the most misunderstood concepts in our Islamic society. To really understand this issue one has to go back 1400 years during the time of our Profit Mohammad (PBUH)and the early days of Islam. We know very well historically that from the very start the spread of Islam was not a casual cup of tea. Lots of human sacrifices were made in fighting with the non believers. Mostly it was the men who laid there lives in numerous battles for the sake of spreading the word of GOD and His Profit. We also know the economic and social structures of that time. We also know that woman was like an out cast during the pre Islamic time, her job mainly was to keep the house running and bare children (specially boys - sadly still practised today). Now if her husband died during the fighting she hardly had any option of having a respectful exisitance in the society other than becoming a mistress, a prostitute , a house maid or just simply kill her self and the children (if they were young). For this very reason our Profit (PBUH) said that one can marry 4 times. The first is of choice and the rest is out of necessity for the women in need of respect in the society. Unfortunatly now we have our Muslim brothers who mis use this to their personal and physical pleasures. Furhtermore, our Profit (PBUH) has set a personal example by marrying Hazrat Khadija and showing us that a woman's place is not only in the house but as an equal to man in all respects. If we deny this it is our own foly and surely we will pay a very high price for it, infact we are paying a very high price. I hope its not for long.
One thing I want to make clear to all our muslim brothers is that I do not in any sense mean to play cheap on your religion or indirectly abuse you, your religion, or prophet. The question simply came to my mind because someone told me that prophet married more than four times simultaneously and I was wondering whether anyone had the guts to challenge his behaviour as he was teaching something else.
Now the answers I have got so far do not in any way explain whether his act was anti-Islamic or not but instead I have got and lecture on why four marriages were allowed at that time by the prophet (although Islam was suppose to be a religion for all time to come and not only for that time). Can anyone now shed a light on whether anyone at that time or for times to come challenged prophet's behaviour when he was formulating such a strict religion for others but taking liberties on his own.
Please don't explain prophet's reasons for marrying but just say whether it should be challenged as per Islamic laws or not and if it should be then why nobody dared.
dhir...>>Can anyone now shed a light on whether anyone at that time or for times to come challenged prophet's behaviour when he was formulating such a strict religion for others but taking liberties on his own.<<
Islam has two main threats now a days. One is from the outside world who is eager and all the time waiting to label it selective, discriminatory, and fundamental. The other is from within the umma. The Muslims who are poorly educated and keep singing the lyrics of the mullas who himself had conducted no research and becomes Imam, just by calling for the prayer.
I am not going into the detail of how many wives our beloved prophet, pbuh had at one time. It is disputed. Some say while nine other say eleven. But that is not important here. The important part is that Qura~n, which is the basic constitution for a Muslim was revealed in over 22 years. Its injunctions were to be implimented after they were revealed. Likewise, when the restriction of marrying only four woman in one time was ordained, the Prophet pbuh already had more than four. It was not fair to divorce anyone at that time. However, he did not marry anymore after this rule.
Does that answer your question?
Thanks Baykhtyar for the to the point reply. That settles that. Now similarly a lot of mughal kings in India were marrying a lot more than what is permitted in Quran, why is it that nobody labelled these kings as Kafirs.
Dear Dhir…Sorry for the intruption. I was away. As regards to your new question, it must be pointed out first of all that ‘kafir’ is the one who does not believe in Allah. Even if one does not believe in Prophet Mohammad, pbuh, he is still not kafir. As you can will realise that people of Divin faith, like Christians and Jews, those who hold a Devin Ordination in the shap of book or set of rules, are not called kafirs. They may be declared munkirs. Meaning they deny the Prophethood of the last Prophet, Mohammad, pbuh.
So these Moghuls who do married multiple women, I mean more than four in one time, cannot be declared kafir on this basis. I may agree with you that such act theirs is definately out of the fold of Islam. You may call them depraved. But not kafir.
there is site hosted by hindu fanatics denigrating islam and prophet(pbuh)www.flex.com/~jai/satyamevjayate/index.html.we should do something to stop this blasphemy.
[This message has been edited by mulla omar (edited July 25, 2000).]
The religion Islam was sent on this earth in the period of 40 years, it didn't just came in one day.
Now ur question ....
The rule of marrying four came in the very late days of islam at that time Prophet was already married to many of his wives. Prophet was given an option to keep his wives or leave them to accomplish the rule but he preffered to keep them as .... his wives are "umm-ul-mauminin" and couldn't marry anyone else if Prophet would have left them.
"(although Islam was suppose to be a religion for all time to come and not only for that time)."
Dhir, yes Islam is the relegion of all times, what is Islam first of all, its believing in ONE GOD, Adam was the first man on earth, and Islam was his relegion because he believed in one ALMIGHTY ALLAH, but the rules were set according to the time period, at the time of Moses, pork was not set haraam, sharaab wasn't haraam either, but that does'nt mean the relegion Moses followed wasn't ISLAM, it was Islam but certain things weren't restricted, but During the time of last Prophet Muhammad (p.b.u.h) rules were set, because as you know, Muslims believe that Muhammad (p.b.u.h) is the last prophet so the relegion is completed during his time by setting ceratin rules.
i got to jet right now
i'll come back to this topic later
Masooma