PREFACE

Polygamy is a practice that has been heavily, frenziedly and ceaselessly assailed by orientalists to call great Islam into serious questions and malign its honest messenger Muhammad.

 Polygamy was verbally attacked as early as the era of Prophet Muhammad himself, when Jews attempted to cast doubts on the validity of the system.

 Omar, who was Ghafra's slave, narrated, "Jews, upon seeing Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) marrying a great deal of women, said: Look at this man who never eats his full, and who, we swear by God, is keenly interested in women". They seem to have cast covetous eyes on, and found fault with, Prophet Muhammad for his polygamous practice. So covetous they were that they said, may Allah curse them, "If he were really a prophet, he would not be so eagerly interested in women". Huyay son of Akhtab, a leading Jew, was the one who most criticized the prophet.

 However, Allah ‑ exalted be He ‑ belying them, told them about His grace and amplitude of means which He has endowed His prophet with. Marking the occasion, Allah has revealed to His prophet the verse reading, "Or do they envy mankind for what Allah has given them out of His bounty?”[1], referring to His prophet Muhammad. The same verse goes to say further "But We had already given the people of Abraham the Book and Wisdom, and conferred upon them a great Kingdom", obviously referring to what Allah ‑ exalted be He ‑ has conferred upon David and Solomon (peace be upon them both) of wives and female slaves: each one of them had married more than Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) was to have later.[2]

 Throughout ages, foes of this religion, inside and outside alike, have been attempting to discredit the principle of polygamy, with their ultimate goal as being to plunge deeply into skepticism the Holy Quran, the Shari'ah and Prophet Muhammad himself.

 A Muslim country has carried matters to such an exaggerative degree that it has introduced a toughened‑up anti‑polygamy law on the model of Western nations.

 In Egypt, Jihan, the wife of late president Anwar El‑Sadat, has one day attempted a similar ban on polygamy, but well‑grounded ulema (religious scholars) of Al‑Azhar, and members of the entire sweeping Islamic trend, have managed to nip in the bud the attempted barring of polygamy. (Unfortunately, Jihan did later succeed in having a certain law passed, which regarded polygamy as in itself posing harm to the first wife, thus empowering a first wife to bring a lawsuit for divorce.  In the wake of President Sadat's murder, with his widow having almost no influence to wield, this law article has later been rescinded.

 Nevertheless, media have persistently been having a bad press of polygamy, though permissible in the Shari'ah. As media have been ridiculously depicting polygamists, as exhibited by vile, low‑quality films and TV serials, they have, at the same time, been alluring enormities as a matter of jocularity. A secular woman has even appeared on an international television station lately to assail polygamy as introduced by Islam.

 Some others have been so insolent and perverse to have published in a Cairo‑based weekly newspaper a set of serial articles under the title of "polygamy is haram" ‑ or polygamy is not permitted by religion. So simply an obscure ignorant attempt, with a foolish and insane stroke of the pen, to suspend the application of confirmed texts of the Holy Quran and Sunna (Traditions of the Prophet).

 Public opinion in Muslim nations has even been so led astray that women in Egypt's rural areas have been circulating a common saying about a man planning to keep another wife to the effect that they would rather proceed in his funeral than proceed in his marriage ceremony.

 These reasons, and others, have prompted me to write this book, which I regard as only a modest attempt at rectifying fallacious notions and straightening out matters ‑ and it is Allah alone whose assistance can be sought in the face of all such blasphemy.

Chapter One

PRE‑ISLAM POLYGAMY

It is not Islam that has ushered in polygamy. As historically confirmed, polygamy has been known since ancient times ‑ a phenomenon as old as mankind itself With polygamy having been a commonplace practice since Paranoiac times, Ramses II ‑ Pharaohs' most celebrated King (reigned 1292‑1225B.C.)‑ Kept eight wives, and scores of concubines and female slaves who gave him more than one hundred and fifty sons and daughters. Temple walls, with the names of wives, concubines and children inscribed on them, stand vividly in witness of the practice. Beautiful Queen Neferteri was the most celebrated of Ramses II's wives, followed in rank and order by Queen Asiya Nefer otherwise known as Isis Nefer, who bore him his son King Merenbetah. Merenbetah was to ascend to the throne later following the death of his father and elder brothers.

 History books give an account of Moses' Pharaoh as having kept several wives, including Asiya (May Allah be pleased with her), who was his female cousin too. Having failed to give him any children, she held Moses to her bosom when her maids picked him up from a box floating in the Nile River.  The Holy Quran relates her story in the surah (chapter) of the "Narration" as follows, "(Here is) a joy of the eye, for me and for you: do not slay him. It may be that he will be of use to us, or we may adopt him as a son".[3]

 Polygamy was not less commonplace during Abraham's era than it had been in ancient Pharaonic times. Hajar, Prophet Abraham's second wife, gave birth to Ishmael, who would have been slain, and who is the forefather of all Arabs. His first wife Sarah gave Prophet Abraham Ishaq. (Peace be upon them all).

  Prophet Yaaqub (Jacob) kept two sister wives, who were his maternal uncle Laban's two daughters. In addition to the two wives, named Liya and Raheel,[4] Prophet Jacob had two female slaves, owned by him and with them he used to have legitimate intimacies as this practice has long been known when the female slaves are owned by the master. The four women Prophet Jacob kept ‑ the two wives and two female slaves ‑ gave him the so-called tribes (eleven sons). It was his wife Raheel who gave him his son Yusuf, and later gave him Benjamin. She was Prophet Jacob's most beloved woman he legitimately kept.

 Prophet Dawud (peace be upon him) kept several wives and numerous female slaves. His son Solomon, also a prophet, had a lot of wives and female slaves.

 In this context, we should not let go unheeded the malicious rumors and gross lies deliberately mongered by Jews about Prophet Dawud.

 Enamoured of the wife of one of his military commanders, Prophet Dawud is falsely claimed to have sent him to his death at the battlefront and married his widow.

 Having been as despicable as such, the lie has been vehemently dismissed as absolutely ungrounded by major interpreters of the Holy Quran, including Ibn Katheer.

Imam Ibn Katheer has further branded the purported incident as a lie interpolated by Jews, which should be brushed aside.[5]

 A belief in the infallibility of prophets (peace be upon them all) is an invariable principle of true faith. To regard chastity, and noble manners, of prophets with the least skepticism is to be outspokenly infidel ‑ we seek refuge with Allah that we should not be one of those casting doubts on chastity of prophets.

 Prophets Dawud and Soliman had many wives and scores of female slaves sexually enjoyed. Hence, one can not perceive that either one of them still needed more women to satisfy his sexual desires. Moreover, it is not less imperceptible that it was Prophet David, who had been known to observe fasting every other day, should resort to mean trickery by getting rid of his senior commander to fill in his place with his widow.

 Polygamy was also widespread in pre‑Islam Arabian peninsula.

 Imam Al‑Bukhari (may Allah be pleased with him) narrated, according to an authentic chain of narrators, that when Ghilan of the Thaqif tribe (a companion of the prophet) embraced Islam he had ten wives. Prophet Muhammad (may peace be upon him), said to him, 'Select four legal wives of them".

 Abou Dawoud (may Allah be pleased with him) reported in his collection of prophetic Traditions, that Umayra of the Assad tribe said, "When I embraced Islam, I had eight wives. When I told prophet Muhammad (may peace be upon him) he said, "Keep four of them".

 Al Imam A]‑Shafi'y (may Allah be pleased with him) reported that Nawfal son of Mu'awiya Al‑Dailamy said, "When I embraced Islam, I had five wives, so Prophet Muhammad (may peace be upon him) said to me, "Keep four wives ‑ whomever four you like ‑ and divorce the remaining one".

 Imam Al‑Bukhari reported in the Book of Niqah (Wedlock) that Prophet Muhammad (may peace be upon him) made a bond of brotherhood between Abdul‑Rahman son of Awf and Saad son of Al‑Rabi Al‑Ansari. Al‑Ansari had two wives, so he very generously offered to give Abdul‑Rahman half his wives and property. Abdul‑Rahman replied, "May Allah bless you with your wives and property. Just kindly show me the market and I can manage my affairs".

 Polygamy was frequent among Slavic, who now account for Russians, Serbs, Czechs and Slovaks, dotted all along Lithuania, Estonia, Macedonia, Romania and Bulgaria.

 Germans and Saxons also widely practiced polygamy. (Germans and Saxons are the two major races to which almost all the population of Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Belgium, the Netherlands, Denmark, Sweden, Norway and England belong). Pagans in Africa, India, China, Japan as well as other southeast Asian regions have always been polygamists.

 Dr. Muhammad Fouad Al‑Hashemi confirms "the Church as having recognized polygamy up to the 17^th century".[6]

None of the four gospels is known to have explicitly barred polygamy. It so happened that some European peoples, dictated only by non‑polygamy pagan traditions, barred the practice of keeping more than one wife. (Only some peoples were known to have barred polygamy, since most European peoples ‑ as mentioned before ‑ practiced it on the largest possible scale). When that anti‑polygamy minority converted to Christianity, it clamped the traditional polygamy ban down on the rest of Christians. As time passed by, Christianity was increasingly, falsely though, believed to have essentially barred polygamy. It is only an old tradition clamped by some down on the others throughout ages.

 Opponents of polygamy are invited to pick up the gauntlet ‑ if they can ‑ and produce any single religious text out of any of the New Testament four gospels, which prohibits polygamy. As to the Old Testament, otherwise known as Torah, it involves explicit texts that polygamy was an accepted practice in the creeds of Abraham (Allah's friend), Isaac, Jacob, Dawud, Soliman as well as other prophets sent to the Children of Israel (peace be upon them all as well as upon our Prophet Muhammad).

 Even socially, sociologists and historians, including Westermark, Hubihos, Hiller and Genburg, note that polygamy was widely known only to peoples who had attained a considerable amount of civilization. Having settled down at river valleys as well as rainy regions, and converted to organized cultivation and grazing, rather than hunting, collecting forest fruit and primitive farming, those peoples adopted polygamy as a widely‑accepted social system. At an earlier more primitive phase, it was family unity and monogamy, which were the prevalent social values.

 Those historians and sociologists, quoted above, go even further to announce that a world of more civilization tends to be heraldic of wider‑scale polygamy. The account given by those scientists‑ who are all non‑Muslims ‑stands in testimony of the validity of polygamy, as introduced by Islam, and strongly refutes the argument of those fallacious opponents of polygamy who plead that it has long been outdated.

 Therefore, polygamy had been, as so far exhibited, a commonly ‑accepted practice even before Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) was sent as a mercy to all mankind. However, polygamy as such was absolutely unrestricted, as the number of wives or concubines ‑ as shown by examples ‑ was limitless. A polygamist was not required to fairly treat his wives, nor had he to do them any justice, as later stipulated by Islam.

 So, if Islam, which is as great, merciful and just as it is, has ordered that wives be treated on a par with each other, put the number of wives kept by a husband at one time at a maximum of four women and banned polygamy if injustice is feared on the part of the husband ‑ why do some come out and object to the practice so ignorantly and over stringently? Does it stand to reason that when heaven descends mercy upon us we throw it back to the most Beneficent and most Merciful?

 Pre‑Islam community was brimful of diverse forms of injustice, crime and enormities covertly and overtly alike.

It was a woman who would always be victimized. A husband would always spend most of his time in the bosom of prostitutes, recognized by red flags raised over their tents, and would go back home only when he is fatigued, having run out of money and physical strength. In the meantime, a wife did not dare to raise her voice in objection.

Another husband would stay for several months in a row with a wife of his, whom he considers the most beautiful of all, conferring gifts and enormous money exclusively on his children by her, with the other wife or wives ‑ let alone their children ‑ never daring to articulate a single word in resistance to this gross inequality.

So what if Islam has permitted polygamy making it restrictively hinging upon justice, mercy as well as marital duties and tribute to all wives and children on a par with each other ‑ why do we reject it and assail with abusive words the divine legislation, Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) and the entire religion.

Truly it is not their eyes that are blind, but the hearts in their chests.

Chapter Two

LEADERS’ MISTRESSES

Mourners walking in the funeral procession of France's late president Francois Mitterrand whispered out of astonishment and curiosity when they saw a lady wearing a black hat and thick, dark sunglasses, accompanied by a blonde girl whose face showed that she was really and deeply in grief, paying last respects to the president's dead body as they walked side by side with the late president's widow. However, the funeral turned topsy‑turvy when it was revealed that the lady was the late president's mistress and the blonde girl was his illegitimate child given birth to through marital infidelity.

 Indeed, it is Paris, the world's most fantastic and freaky city: the wife and the mistress seen walking side by side, having seemingly developed mutual understanding and accord that it was then no use vying with each other after Mitterrand himself had passed away.

 Some time later, a Swedish female journalist, identified as Kristina Forsen, released a book called "Francois Told Me" ‑ by Francois she meant the late French president Francois Mitterrand. The book and the exciting photos on the inside pages showed a sinful love story and another marital infidelity with her by the late French president ‑ much to the surprise of France and the entire world.

 Interviewed by major newspapers of France and the world, which rushed to have lengthy talks with her on her affair with president Mitterrand, Kristina Forsen disclosed that her love affair with the president ran for 17 years. One such newspaper, "France Soir" reported "Marvin" ‑ an eight‑year‑old handsome boy living with Kristina ‑ as having illegitimately been born to her by Parisian philanderer Mitterrand.

 Declining to identify Marvin's father to profession colleagues, she yelled, "He is my own son alone! And I will not ever make known his father's name. I will not let anybody trespass on this very private part of my life".

 Recounting her affair with Mitterrand from the very beginning, Kristina said that she had first met him in 1979 when she was introduced to him by the late Swedish prime minister Olof Palme as an enthusiastic journalist who wished to interview him. Although he was as doubly old as she was, an age discrepancy never hindered a relation to grow.

 Commenting on the age discrepancy, she said, "In such cases names, ages and positions fall deeply into oblivion. We then only recall a sense of ecstasy, being enraptured in lost moments".

 Kristina was never ashamed when the French press alluded to her as having been a thorn right into the heart of the French president's family. Answering back, she said, "Neither his family, the entire political quarters, nor anybody around him can assail or disparage me. Simply, they did not have what I had, so they had to withdraw quietly. They realized that I was to him the breeze, which he freely breathed in, out of his golden case and his boring traditional life! It was I who broke the boredom he had been feeling throughout his life before he met me; he found within me an independent approach of thinking about all matters of his life, which he had never experienced before".

 Kristina recounted a great deal which people did not know about president Mitterrand. She disclosed that they had a private house in the woods, where they met unnoticed by his wife, the press, or even, his personal guards. In short, they only needed a small official document, which would have made the affair a legitimate and clean one, and imparted legitimacy and social respectability to their son Marvin, but they had not done so.

 Egyptian veteran columnist Anees Mansour wrote in his daily "Al‑Ahram" newspaper column on France's politician George Clemenceau, whom he described as the tiger of France's politics. Mansour said, "George Clemenceau who lived between 1841 ‑ 1929, waged horrible political battles and defeated everybody whom he fought. He was able to talk to twenty people about twenty subjects at one and the same time! However, no one had ever perceived that the shrewd politician kept 800 mistresses, who gave birth to forty illegitimate children".

 Mansour further said "But when he knew that his American wife was experiencing marital infidelity, he got up at midnight and opened the door to let her go down the street in her nightdress. Clemenceau, like all human wolves, despised women most. Nobody else assailed, or disparaged, women as he did either on his playful bed or illness bed."

In Austria, the press has exposed President Thomas Klestil as taking a mistress who was an employee with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Newspapers have tracked their relation back to those years when he had held the position of Minister of Foreign Affairs before he assumed presidency. The scandal triggered off has sent his wife Edith Klestil leaving the house in anger and demanding divorce.

 In 1994, Chinese doctor Li Zi Zhui released an interesting book in the US about the life of Chinese leader Mao Tse Tung called "The Barbaric Life of Chairman Mao". The book is exclusively devoted to Mao's private life as closely seen by doctor Li, who was the Chinese leader's private doctor.

 Li says in his book that Mao Tse Tung was the absolute governor of one of the world's most powerful nations. He was a Communist tyrant whose orders could not be checked and caprices had to be meekly yielded to. He was a savage wolf who was never satisfied with sex, changing girls as simply as he changed his socks and shoes. He would throw noisy balls, arranged by his assistants, to pick up whomever girl he desires from the hundreds of young girls attending.

 The author doctor further relates that chairman Mao believed that sex was the only way to prolong life. He developed a lot of contagious venereal diseases and took much delight in communicating the disease to as many Chinese girls as possible, who would, strangely enough, boast having contracted the disease as the only evidence of having actually met the Chinese leader.

 President Carlos Menem of Argentina has also been involved in countless sexual encounters, with world newspapers daily uncovering his scandals, though such scandalous stories have not, of course, deterred him. Having failed to curb his scandalous adventures, his wife has had to get divorce in the wake of a crushing dispute.

 As to US leaders, one can talk limitlessly about their love affairs and sexual encounters, as the US people does not ever recognize anything as covert at all.   The US people is a scandal‑mongering people, especially if there is a celebrity involved, whatever the area they may be in! They do not place any lid on the publication ‑ by any means whether it be the press, radio or television ‑ of any person whatever, his position, influence or wealth. Books scandalizing senior government or business people are lapped up by Americans and are best sellers.

 One such exciting book is "Inside the White House", authored by famous US journalist Ronald Kissler. In his book, Kissler pursues the whims and love affairs of most presidents of the world's most powerful nation, down to the minute details of the sexual infidelities conducted by each one of them.

 The ugly president of the US, Linden Johnson, made love to five of the eight secretaries he had right at the heart of the White House. He would ferret for pretty women amid reception crowds; when he found out one, he sent one of his aides to bring her to him, as presidential wishes have to be made true.

 One day Lady Bird, President Linden Johnson's wife, opened the door of the White House's Oval Office to find her husband in a position of indecent exposure with a secretary, right with the same office as he received visiting world leaders. Following a heated debate, President Johnson called his personal guards and yelled at them that they should have done anything to stop her. One of them bravely replied, "We did not make any mistake; this is your problem alone".

 Notwithstanding, the US president persisted in his brash behavior. All what he did was to order an "early alarm" system at the lift to warn him beforehand that his wife was on the way, so that he might not be caught red‑handed in the very act of marital infidelity. If the guards see his wife heading for the lift leading up to the Oval Office, they should give him a ring to let him know his wife is on her way for him to get tucked.

 President Johnson had love affairs with other female journalists and girls, whom his assistants would pimp for him. On a single occasion, President Johnson brought three girls in one batch from his Texas farm and appointed them as White House employees to be at his beck and call.

 President Franklin Roosevelt of the US, who came to power in 1933 and was re‑elected for a third term of office in 1940, was highly womanizing, although he moved on a wheel chair. His most famous mistress was a woman identified as Lucy Ratherford. He met her regularly when his wife Eleanor Roosevelt was away.

Ruth, the former US president Jimmy Carter's sister, was a Christianizing preacher, or, as otherwise called in the West, was in the missionary activity. She would preach on heaven's teachings, calling on non‑Christians to convert to Christianity. All of a sudden, the truth unfolded: she was deeply involved in a sexual relation with Germany's former chancellor Willie Brandt. US and German newspapers extensively reported, in detail, on the love affair between the "married preacher" and the former German Chancellor. The Christian preacher's husband was the last to know about his wife's sexual infidelity.

 Experiencing the same situation was one of the most famous Christian preachers in the US and the entire world, namely clergyman Jimmy Swaggart who engaged in a very famous debate with the great Islamic preacher Sheikh Ahmad Didat.

 The celebrated Christianizing preacher conceded, as major television stations, in detail, were interviewing him having a sexual relation with a prostitute. However, it was Swaggart himself who would always, before being scandalized, preach virtue and show in a bad light polygamy as well as other teachings introduced by Islam, while he himself was indulged up to his ears in a filthy mire of sins which he would forbid his followers to even approach.

 Hence, Swaggart, who had talked abusively about true Islam, has toppled over and fallen, publicly confessing that the circles of Christianizing preachers have always been the scene of the most horrible and repugnant prostitution, homosexuality and marital infidelity. (And say: "Truth has (now) arrived, and Falsehood perished: For Falsehood is (by its nature) Bound to perish").[7]

The late US president John Kennedy acquired worldwide notoriety for having been sexually infidel with a lot of women. His most celebrated mistress had been the sultry actress Marilyn Monroe, who was later mysteriously murdered. The killing is believed to have been masterminded by the US Central Intelligence Agency, CIA.

 Robert, president John Kennedy's younger brother, was also involved in a relation with Monroe at the same time as his elder brother had an affair with her, and used to meet her in his office, when he was the US general attorney.

 President Kennedy had taken tens of mistresses before he tied the knot with Jacquelyn. Two of his secretaries, identified as blonde Videl and brunette Fadel, as well as a third girl identified as Judith Campel, who worked with Mafia, were among those whom he had been womanizing with before he married Jacquelyn.

 Even the former US president George Bush did not survive being caught in the crossfire of traded marital infidelity charges. US, author Susan Trenfu cited in one of her books a senior US delegate to Geneva disarmament talks as having arranged a making‑love meeting between the then US vice‑president George Bush (during the era of president Ronald Reagan) and Jennifer, who was an assistant to Bush. The meeting took place in a Geneva guesthouse in 1984. Of course, major newspapers and TV stations scandalously publicized the rendezvous.

 However, it is incumbent US President Bill Clinton who has been the most notorious human wolf of all US presidents in post‑Kennedy era. He has been re‑elected to a second term of office despite all the furore sparked off by his scandalous sexual infidelities, widely exhibited by hundreds of books, researches as well as press and TV reports.

 President Bill Clinton has himself confessed to his widely reported sexual affairs. Assertively declining to elaborate on any of such love affairs, President Clinton has confirmed the exposure by media of his private affairs as having led him into a deep family crisis, which would have sent his marriage bursting at the seams.

 President Clinton's listed mistresses are to the tune of thirty women.

 The most celebrated of them all has been Monica Lewinsky, the centerpiece of the "Monicagate" scandal. Because of his affair with her, President Clinton has been impeached, amid public outcries that he should be ousted. Interviewed by TV, she has conceded, in detail, to be involved in a sexual affair with the president.

 Before Monica, there had also been Jennifer Flowers, Paula Jones and scores of others.

 A recently published book, called "In the Lobby of Congress", reveals scores of sexual scandals made by reverent representatives and senators at the venerable US Congress.

 Moreover, countless sex‑motivated crimes, incidents and scandals are daily reported by thousands of newspapers, magazines as well as radio and TV networks in the West as having been made by celebrated politicians, sportsmen, actors and people in all walks of life.

 We have had to publish some of those sexual scandals, which said to be done by community leaders in those countries that ban polygamy. Polygamy is not only prohibited in such nations, but penal codes in so many of them make it a punishable misdemeanor which carries a prison term, whereas adultery goes unheeded if it takes place by common consent! We are assertively saying that such an amount of filth has had to be exposed and brought into the spotlight to let those who rise up in arms against polygamy be knowledgeable about what an immoral alternative there is to it.

 A line of demarcation is thus being distinctively drawn between what is wrong and what is right of the issue in question. Polygamy is a reality which cannot be dismissed as non‑existing, whether it be permitted ‑ as so stipulated by Islam ‑ or not as the case is in many of the non‑Muslim communities, where illegitimate relations do exist on the largest perceivable scale in place of polygamy.

 The situation, as thus far reviewed, constitutes a question to those dyed‑in‑the‑wool occidentalists who adamantly resist polygamy as permitted by Shari'a, which is more graceful and honorable, polygamy or a multitude of mistresses? Do you permit an intimacy only on the chaste nuptial bed, or you will be doing as dictated by Satan in both the east and west?

 Men have not ever been known to outnumber women in any country across the globe. On the contrary, official statistical figures denote otherwise. (A separate chapter will be devoted to a review of such statistics). Moreover, if men presumably, only for the sake of argument, outnumber women, polygamy will spontaneously fall out of practice and any debate over it will only be futile.

Chapter Three

EASILY ‑ REFUTABLE OBJECTIONS

 Opponents of polygamy do, in fact, regard the practice from only the single viewpoint of wives regardless of hundreds of millions of lonely, wretch women dotted everywhere around the world. This has vividly been demonstrated at discussions I have had with hundreds of men and women from countries as widely apart as Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Tunisia, Azerbaijan, Turkey, France, Germany, Switzerland, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, the US, Cyprus, Saudi Arabia and Egypt of course.

 Keeping another wife is highly detrimental, and does gross inequality, to the first wife, many polygamy opponents polled by me do plead. They argue that a polygamist's wife loses a half of her husband to a second wife, two thirds to a second and third wives, while retains only a quarter of her husband if he keeps three other wives besides her.

 They also allegedly say that a husband, married to more than one wife, cannot mete out justice to them. They cite, out of context, a verse of the Holy Quran, saying, "You are never able to be fair and just as between women, even if it is your ardent desire", intentionally skipping the rest of the verse saying, "But do not turn away (from a woman) altogether, so as to leave her (as if were) hanging (in the air). If you come to a friendly understanding, and practice self‑restraint out of Allah's fear, Allah is oft forgiving and Most Merciful".[8]

 On the pages to follow an interpretation of the aforesaid verse will be given, including diverse opinions as given by commentators, in order to shed light upon the provisions set forth by the verse which run on a collision course with the standpoint made public by polygamy opponents.

 However, an alleged detriment done to the first wife has, above all, to be refuted. It is not true that only getting married to another wife does gross injustice to the first one, as they falsely claim, since she must have assuredly realized that it is Islam which so empowers him ‑ so long as the wives kept at one time are not in excess of four.

 Therefore she has no right whatsoever to bar him from marrying another wife, or other wives, unless she has, beforehand, attached a relevant condition when writing out the marriage contract. She is not empowered to make a marital tie only monogamous, whereas Allah has bestowed upon husbands, when financially secure and physically able, a license of polygamous marriages.

 Second, Allah, as the ultimate law and Shari'a giver, has only restrictively made access to polygamy, making it absolutely incumbent upon a polygamist to administer justice to all wives kept at a time. A wife under a practice as such restricted will never be stripped of her husband, should the latter get married to another or others. He is obliged to equally provide for all wives, and to justly distribute everything among them including equally staying overnight with each one of them. Although a wife in such a position will have less of her husband, she will not be losing him, once and for all, to a mistress or more.

 Third, life necessitates that each of the two spouses should partially sacrifice their desires to their mutual interest, to the community's public interest or even to the other spouse's benefit if one spouse is really in love with the other. Islam abhors egocentricity, calling for altruism rather than hideous egotism.

 Nowadays, millions of husbands travel abroad for one year or more in pursuit of their livelihoods, leaving behind their wives and children. Much to our surprise, those lamenting that a wife of a polygamist will have less of her husband do not ever utter any objection to a wife totally stripped, for ages, of her husband who is always away earning his livelihood abroad. Conversely, they promote such a practice as a major hard‑currency earner for the government, even at the expense of wives.

 The fact that hundreds of millions of husbands are recruited in the armed services all over the world, leaving their wives and children behind for the sake of defending one's nation, has not ever provoked a public outcry that men should be kept beside their families rather than sent to the army; or is it a question of only dismantling Allah's Shari'a?

 Some other men leave on trade mission, or for studying at universities in other nations, with the married of them having, as a matter of course, to leave alone wives until they have completed studying in a few years' time. However, opponents of polygamy do not object, despite the fact that a polygamist husband goes back to his wife's bosom in a day, two days or even a week; while a husband on a trade or studying mission is away for at least a year, or even years as exhibited above?

 One more significant fact has to be taken into account; namely a wife is not always available for making love to. In the wake of childbirth, during a forty‑day post‑birth bleeding period, an intimacy (sexual intercourse) is absolutely forbidden. The husband himself may be taken ill, keeping away from the nuptial bed for sometime as a result; he wife, in her turn, may also develop any sort of disease which tends to estrange her from her husband for a while too. This is the natural course of matters, which cannot be bypassed or obstinately ignored. Not least to be forgotten is menstruation, which keeps flowing from a week to a forth night in some cases, sending husbands away from any intimacy until it totally stops flowing.

 In a nutshell, there is no such a husband who is glued to his wife all the time. Even a healthy residing husband has at present to bum the midnight oil for a stepped‑up income for his family, in which case he is always back home so late at night. Therefore, the fact that not so many husbands are solely devoted to entertaining wives has to be inarguably conceded. Consequently, polygamy should not thus be exaggeratively magnified as exacting a heavy toll of gross inequality on the first wife.

 Fourth, which is preferable if a married man is enamoured of another woman: should he divorce the first one ‑ in which case she may be ill, aged or infertile ‑ or he had better retain her in wedlock and let her enjoy the same privileges as the other wife, or other wives, on a par?

 Fifth, is it not more graceful and honorable for a husband to marry the woman whom he is enamoured of, rather than taking her as only a concubine in darkness stripped of any rights, together with her guiltless would‑be offspring who would otherwise end up in orphanage if the father is not allowed to marry their mother?

 Sixth, if officially‑released statistics in many parts of the world have already substantiated a claim that women more than doubly outnumber men, with persisting war claiming more lives and sending much wider apart the already gaping discrepancy between the numbers of both genders, how can this grave disequilibrium be offset And what a gloomy fate is there in store for hundreds of millions of poor, miserable ladies who have lost the spouse who maintained the family, or stand an increasingly dimming chance of picking up husbands in view of scarcity of men, of whom millions have perished in rabid, unbarring war?H Should we illegitimately abandon them unmarried, just because a fewer wives are so womanly egocentric that they cannot stand the notion of their husbands being shared by others? Or should we leave them openly susceptible to homosexuality, taking lovers beyond wedlock or inhibition and deprivation?

 Legislation, while catering to diverse community needs, should always keep in mind an indispensable balance between apparently ambivalent interests of rival community classes, such as a balance struck between employers and employees as well as between landlords and tenants. Hence, great Islam substantially envisages a social balance between a wider majority of the unmarried women, on the one hand, and the married ones, on the other. It is not fair, in Egypt, as an example, to let the scales heavily tip in favor of eight, or even ten, million wives against ten million other women and girls who eagerly await a fair share of life. It is almost fair, merciful and humanitarian to let them share husbands with those married women for enjoying nuptial life, sympathy and care.

 There is one more point brought up by opponents of polygamy. They allege that a man's sexual desire cannot only be curbed through polygamy. However, this is an obviously fallacious claim, running counter to reality and the natural course of things. If a man has two, three or four wives he fully quenches, in most cases, his emotional and sexual desires, becoming much less susceptible to sinning.

 Most important of all, polygamy is not intended only for quenching lust. As mentioned above, psychologists underline quenching an ardent desire for emotion as more significant than merely catering to one's instinctive sexual need. Making love should not be the only target of marriage. Emotional tranquility, passion, mercy, begetting good offspring, social coherence by marriage relationship, as well as taking care of, and providing for, women and children are all qualities which are far and beyond having sex in order to curb a galloping desire. Moreover, men are as diverse in virility ~ they are in gluttony.

 Above all, polygamy, as a system recognized by Islam, is not required to raise people to the lofty ranks of chaste, infallible angels who worship Allah all the time and do as ordered; nor has the great Islamic Shari'a made it imperative on Muslims to thus upgrade themselves. We are, in the first place, fallible human beings. However, what Shari'a really targets is to as much spare society prospective evils as possible: a Muslim should thus be armed with all ways and means that will urge him to lower his eyes and keep his genitals from sin. Allowing polygamy is one such means, with the condition of imperatively maintaining equality among all wives. The situation so created by granting easier access to polygamy tends to help wives, in turn, to adhere to clarity, purity, lowering eyes and preserving genitals from adultery.

 Nevertheless, some will act perversely. A case in point is when the modem state makes jobs available, but some, despite legitimate job availability, take perverse delight in larceny, theft or drug trafficking to make illicit gains. The modem state is only attempting a cutback, as much as it can, on those acting perversely, and this is exactly what the wise Islamic Shari'a envisages. To reduce the number of offenders of Allah's orders has always been an awesome goal of the Sharia. (Empowering husbands to have more than one wife, under certain conditions and controls, is a means to the end of reducing those sexually offending). To absolutely eliminate offending is impossible in the mundane world of fallible human beings who can not resist being entrapped into sinning, although, of course, those, grappling with the evil‑abetting soul, who repent and return to Allah's fold are the morally best.

 It is still noteworthy that there are estimated tens of millions of widows and divorcees who keep rummaging around for a sustainer who will act the compassionate father to their children, even though he is not at all involved in any nuptial role, with the actual reality supporting this.

 Faults allegedly made by some polyg4mists should not, by any means, reckoned to be true Islam. To remedy such faults cannot be achieved by scrapping polygamy itself Rather, making people more knowledgeable about an indispensable need for administering justice and all‑round piety and fear of Allah is the salubrious remedy. Again, an aberrant pattern of behavior by some polygamists should not ever be reckoned as true Islam, simply because it swerves from its straight moral path.

 In fact, what the commons do by meting out injustice to women and unequally treating children is the immediate consequence of a grave lack of correct Islamic tenets. Moreover, media make things all the worse by disseminating moral I y‑ subversive notions and values which run on a collision course with great Islam.

 So nervously a young gentleman wondered: where in the first place is that polygamy you are talking about, while most youths cannot manage to have a job, modest flat or Mahr (money paid by the groom to the bride in Islam) to pay to only one woman to marry? He went on wondering: a youth like us keeps scrimping for ten years on average in order to ultimately propose marriage to hardly one girl, so how do you demand youth to take another wife?

 To answer this question is much simpler than our friend thinks, whom we have to excuse for what he said in view of the fact that youths are gravely financially strapped in an economic crisis‑ridden Islamic world, and for which we supplicate Allah to mightily lift it.

A talk of polygamy should, axiomatically, be addressed only to those so capable, rather than low‑income nascent young gentlemen, for whom we supplicate Allah to support, and provide for, from a source they could not have imagined. Capability is thus indispensable for anyone wishing to marry, monogamist or polygamist be he.

 Capability is identified as a multi‑faceted quail. involving the following:

firstly, enough solvency to provide for wives and children alike;

secondly, physical strength. An ill husband is not perceived of as having many wives, while he cannot make his first wife sexually satisfied by catering to her legitimate instinctive sexual desire. Therefore, a would‑be polygamist should be capable of having reasonably enough intimacies to make his two or more wives sexually satisfied.

thirdly, there should be psychological strength to fairly deal with wives on the part of a would‑be polygamist. So, he should as much resist as possible his heartily slant towards a particular one of them. Equally providing for, staying overnight with, and even playing and entertaining wives should be sternly applied. His slanted approach to a particular one of them, if there is such a slant, should be made invisible and imperceptible so that he may not hurt the feelings of the other wife or wives.

In our belief, a polygamist husband should put on a par all of his wives, even in terms of the number of intimacies. This is as close an approach as possible to the spirit of the Islamic great legislation, which regards in a very bad light unfairness or inequality in terms of anything. He should even regard, or smile at, them equally ‑ this is closer to piety and fear of Allah. If he assuredly realized that he would not be fair enough when dealing with his wives, he should inevitably then suffice himself with only one wife and divorce the other wife or wives. May Allah then provide the divorcee with another husband, who will, over flowingly, show her compassion and love.

 Strange enough is one certain objection against polygamy, which is falsely pleaded as putting at stake the entire family and increasing children at a time when the government has heavily been trying to pare down the growth of population to head off a claimed imminent population explosion.

 Those who so claim are putting the cart before the horse, as it is a ban on polygamy, which, on the contrary, erodes the very entity of society and family. As exhibited by figures, unmarried girls have been stepping up in number that they are, by manifold, in excess of married women. Against such a backdrop, if polygamy is not granted easier access, sex‑motivated perversity, homosexuality, psychological disorders, suicide, prostitution and taking mistresses and concubines will be rampant along the lines of Europe's demoralized communities. As for an increase in the number of children on account of polygamy, it should be made known, beyond the slightest doubt, that whatever soul Allah has ordained to be created, will accordingly be created and given access by Allah to this mundane world despite whatever objection or resistance by whomsoever.

 All there will be that a respectably‑born legitimate child ‑ whose legal birth by a second, third or fourth revered and well‑beloved wife is being fiercely resisted ‑will instead be born illegally as a love child and be taking his way down the street or to an orphanage, becoming in a few years' time a hardened, professional criminal posing a grave menace to the core of social stability and security.

 Now with the situation so far reviewed, do polygamy opponents still regard this consequence as better than the previously explained result generated by legitimate polygamy? One more thing has to be ultimately spelt out: if human massiveness is managed to be properly cultivated, brought up and refined, it will generate an effective and useful force along the lines of China, Japan and the rest of Asian tigers.

 However, why can not a woman be a polygamist wife, just as a polygamist husband? This is, of course, a highly naive and funny question at the same time, because it overlooks the nature of things and what Allah has lodged into the entity as well as the physical and psychological structure of a woman, who is thus created by Allah to be drastically different from a man. From a point of view, it is impossible to identify an embryo's lineal descent when a wife is sleeping around within the same period of time. A situation thus created will be that of absolute chaos freakily involving lineal descents as well as social and legal ties. For example, whom will this infant, thus born, be an heir to? Who is going to accept him as husband when he cannot identify himself as having so and so father or such and such tribe or family?  Who, out of those with whom his mother has been sleeping around with, will be in charge of taking care of, and providing, for him?

 From another standpoint, modem science has exposed a lot of killer diseases which women susceptibly develop when semen by diverse men flows into the same womb ‑including, Allah forbid, uterus and vaginal cancers as well as AIDS.

 That a wife should exclusively have one husband is an eternal and immaculate system introduced by Allah, the Sustainer of the entire universe, which if flouted, will certainly wreak unbearable and unprecedented havoc upon humans. It is only one husband who should ejaculate sperm into a wife's womb, and claiming otherwise only signals fault and inevitable annihilation.

 One more thing has to be ultimately clarified: how can a multitude of men go into the bedroom of one and the same wife? By Allah, dumb animals do desist from such a pattern of behavior, so a human, whom Allah has honorably preferred to other creatures, had better desist from indulging himself into such a quagmire?

 Prophet Muhammad's Traditions Concerning His Daughter Fatima

Most polygamy opponents attempt to take advantageously the incident of Prophet Muhammad's (Peace be upon him) declining to allow his cousin companion and son‑in‑law Ali son of Abu‑Taleb ‑ who was married to the prophet's (peace be upon him) daughter Fatima ‑ to marry the daughter of Amre son of Hisham, whose running epithet was Abu‑Jahl (literally: "the Ignoramus"). They inarguably plead that Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him), when refusing to let Ali take another wife besides Fatima, has invalidated the originally valid and permissible principle of polygamy, or has at least conceded detriment as taking a heavy toll on the first wife when the husband takes another wife, or wives.

 To invalidate the argument those polygamy opponents say, we have, first of all, to fully cite the prophet's (peace be upon him) hadith (saying) to know the reasons for which he has so declined.

 The hadith reports Ali son of Abu‑Taleb as having proposed marriage to Abu‑Jahl's daughter while he was married to Fatima, the daughter of Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him). The reporter of the hadith, identified as Al Miswar son of Makhrama, says, "I heard Allah's prophet address his audience from his pulpit, and I was adult enough at the time. He (peace be upon him) said (Fatima belongs to me and I fear that she may be tempted out of her faith). The reporter of the hadith then cited Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) as highly commending one of his in‑laws from Abd‑Shams clan. The prophet (peace be upon him) said "He faithfully talked to me and honored what he promised me to do" referring to Abu‑Al‑Aas son of Al Rabi'i (and I do not forbid what Allah has made permissible, nor do I make permissible what Allah has forbidden. But, by Allah, never will the prophet's daughter be meeting at the same place with the daughter of Allah's foe).

 In the same hadith, though otherwise reported in different versions, Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) said, "The offspring of Hisham son of Al‑Mughira have requested my consent to marry their daughter off to Ali son of Abu‑Taleb. But, hereby, I decline to give consent, then I decline to give them consent, then I decline to give them consent, unless Ali son of Abu‑Taleb so wishes to divorce my daughter and marry their own. My daughter belongs to, and is part and parcel of, me: whatever is hurting to her is equally hurting to me; and what exacts a toll on her equally exacts a toll on me".

 In the following lines we will be reviewing the elucidation of the aforesaid hadith, which has been reported by Imam Muslim, (one of the biggest authors of hadiths collections) as interpreted by Imam Al‑Nawawi.

 Imam Al‑Nawawi explains as follows:

 (Jurists have stated: this hadith carries a prohibition of anything harmful to the prophet ‑ peace be upon him ‑while alive by any means or under any circumstances, even if this harm is generated by a matter which is originally permitted. Prophet Muhammad ‑ peace be upon him ‑ has made it publicly known that it is permitted to marry Abu‑Jahl's daughter by having said, "I do not forbid something which is originally permissible". However, he has forbidden that both women be married by the same husband at one and the same time for two reasons. The first reason was being that this was detrimental to Fatima, and as such it was detrimental to the prophet ‑ peace be upon him ‑; whoever harms him brings down on him the wrath of Allah. So, he ‑ peace be upon him ‑ has thus forbidden such a marriage for his full compassion for both Ali and Fatima. The second reason was being he feared for his daughter being tempted out of faith because of womanish jealousy.

 The hadith has also been explained otherwise. The hadith, thus understood, is not intended to forbid marrying the two by Ali, but simply means that the prophet ‑ peace be upon him ‑ knew beforehand from Allah that they would not be married by Ali ‑ as Allah revealed to him further events. As others put it, it was probable that the prophet ‑ peace be upon him ‑ forbade marrying them both by Ali because one is daughter of the Messenger of Allah

And the other is daughter of the foe of Allah, thus adding such a marriage to the women listed by the Holy Quran as forbidden to marry, in which case his saying "I do not forbid anything which is permissible" should be explained as that he does not say anything which offends Allah's rulings or teachings. If

Allah permits something, he cannot forbid it; if He (Allah) forbids it he (the prophet) cannot allow it nor can he remain silent about it ‑ as remaining silent about it could signal consent and permissibility. Jurists thus conclude the explanation of the hadith.)

 If we have the right to add anything, we have to assert that Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him, has obviously identified the reason for his declining to let Ali son of Abu‑Taleb marry the other woman, in addition to Fatima, as having been that the other girl was the daughter of Abu‑Jahl ‑ the tyrant whose running epithet during his life was the foe of Islam. He savagely and brutally fought Islam until the moment he gave up the ghost at the very end of sinful and villainous life. Consequently, the daughter of Allah's foe must not have been dealt with on a par with that begotten by Allah's beloved prophet and His mercy sent to mankind.

 Moreover, it could not have been acceptable that the daughter of Allah's last messenger ‑ who belongs to him as well as part and parcel of him as he, peace be upon him, described her on a lot of occasions ‑ be placed in a position of profanely vying for a husband's heart, which, naturally, entails mutual jealously as well as being locked in heated bantering and argument as the case is in most households. Allah's prophet and his daughter must have been loftier than that cheap clash, involving women in every society and at any time, to win husbands' hearts.

 In addition, Muhammad's daughter presumably sets an example for all women of mankind to follow. In her capacity as such, she must have been safeguarded against any rival women, so that she might be totally devoted, together with her father, to the noble call for peace and Islam.

A special mention has to be made of the fact that there are certain provisions which exclusively apply to Allah's prophets and messengers‑ and their sons and daughters subordinately. Being central to the Islamic faith, such provisions have to be carefully observed. We firmly believe that Fatima is a sister to all Muslims, as her mother, late Khadija (may Allah be pleased with her) is the mother of all the faithful believers as shown by the Holy Quran itself. Fatima's father, Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him), is closer to believers than themselves, and as such he is regarded as the father of every Muslim, be it male or female.

 Therefore, if his daughter Fatima has been a sister to all female Muslims, she should not be combined in marriage with any of her sisters, either by Ali ‑ as his two wives ‑ or by anybody else. And since Fatima is an exception case covered by a special ruling or provision, no other case which is not covered by the Quranic text referred to should be made analogous to her.

 Ultimately, it is not ever legal that Allah's messenger flouts or invalidates a provision, like polygamy, even though Allah has revealed verses of the Holy Quran in acknowledgement thereof. To say that the prophet has flouted or invalidated such a provision is to centrally undermine the tenets of Islam and criminally call into question Prophet Muhammad's deeds.

Chapter Four

FIGURES TALK LOUDER

Allah desires but to manifest His might and mercy every now and then. If a believer has to obey and give in to Allah's teachings and orders, although he does not realize the reason or reasons behind a ruling made by Allah, non‑believers sometimes help bring into the spotlight unawares Allah's teachings, thus causing the divine legislation to unfold its covert wisdom only to an audience of the unbiased non‑believers who ‑ in acknowledgement of the wise divine instructions ‑ kneel down in awe to the great God. An obvious example in case is the permissiveness of polygamy.

As demonstrated by the most up‑to‑date population census conducted in the US, females outnumber males by more than eight million women; in Britain, women are in excess of men by five million females; and in Germany, the ratio of women to men is 3 to1.

 In statistics conducted recently by the weekly "Al Maydan" newspaper[9] of Egypt, only one Egyptian girl out of every ten girls at the age of marriage, which has been pushed up from 22 to 32 years, gets access to marriage. In almost all cases, a potential bridegroom is so well over thirty-five years that he is almost forty years of age. This should not be much to our surprise: a new graduate has to wait for a job for ten to twelve years to obtain it, has to scrimp for some more time and then set off ferreting for his so‑called better halaal "Al Maydan" newspaper goes on to say that accordingly forbidden relations have been increasingly rampant, and so has been the phenomenal common‑law marriage against a background of millions of unmarried women. (By common‑law marriage we mean a form of marriage in which the two would‑be spouses do not dare having their marriage ‑ though legitimate still ‑registered with the officials so authorized by the government). The survey ‑conducted for the newspaper by the two female researchers Ghada Muhammad Ibraheem and Dalia Kamal Azzam under the supervision of the National Center of Sociological and Criminal Studies ‑ has exposed young marriage as having been steeply in decline owing to the ever‑rising standard of life and with unemployment and housing falling well short of the required.

 Another survey, released in the US, puts the number of illegitimate children at one out of every six infants born (as reported by Al‑Akhbar newspaper of 2/7/1968). Undoubtedly, the number across the US is to the tune of millions and millions of illegitimate children annually.

 Both Iraq and Iran have appallingly been undergoing a grave imbalance between men and women in view of the eight‑year‑old heavy war the two nations had been waging against each other. In either of the two countries the ratio of men to women stands at 1:5 or 1:7 in some other regions.

 However, the situation is all the more bizarre and menacing in Bosnia‑Herzegovina, which was plunged into a filthy racial war which had crushingly and ceaselessly persisted from 1992 until 1996. The consequence has been a terrifying ratio of 1:27. Yes, only one man to every twenty‑seven women. The social catastrophe that Muslim nation has been undergoing owing to the scarcity of men and massiveness of women is beyond any stretch of imagination. Communism has been clamped down on that country for tens of years. It jettisoned criminal Communism only to be ensnared in the jaws of a more perishing and criminal crusade. What alternative is there for Muslim girls to do if they can not come across Muslim husbands? Should we let them marry Orthodox Serbs or Catholic Croats just because some over stringent women and men do not acknowledge polygamy? Or is it the fact that those over stringent women and men prefer that Muslim girls should take lovers (adulterers behind the scenes) along Western demoralized lines?

 In a hot press report on the "explosion of bachelor girls", Tahani Al‑Burtuqali, the correspondent in Kuwait of Cairo‑based "Al‑Ahram" newspaper, recalls what happened a few years ago when Kuwait's society experienced the phenomenal sending by hundreds of unmarried girls of letters to Kuwaiti wives, in which each girl demanded the wife to share the husband with her in a bid to keep abreast of the problem of the rising number of bachelor girls in Kuwait's society as well as in Gulf society in general. Another report carried by "Al‑Ahram Al‑Arabi" magazine, on its first issue, said there were estimated 40 thousand girls. The number is not little if compared to the entire population of Kuwait as a whole ‑ it represents 16% of Kuwait's women who account for a little more than 250 thousand people out of an entire population of Kuwait as a whole of half a million people.

 To deprive a woman of emotion is a greater health hazard than to deprive her of sex. The pleasure attained by a woman when having sex, in the absence of emotion, does not excite a woman as much as a gentle word or kind fondling will certainly do, sending her sexually excited to the degree of satisfaction. This remark is underscored by Saed Abdul‑Azeem, a professor of psychiatry and neurology at the Cairo University's Faculty of Medicine. He further explains that a woman's emotional deprivation is the shortest way to acting perversely, sexual frigidity and a wider range of physical and psychological illnesses alike.[10]

 Dr. Muhammad Helal Rifa'i, a gynecologist, assertively says that the lack, or even delay of marriage makes a woman more exposed to breast tumours, uterus cancer as well as fibroid tumours than the married ones. Having been polled, many woman patients who frequent his clinic overwhelmingly said they prefer getting married to an already‑married man than gloomily remaining a bachelor girl. Some of those women patients said they even preferred being a third or fourth wife than being permanently held captive by spinstership.

 If this is the view of science, a woman doctor can, to a greater degree of fidelity, describe what an unmarried woman feels. A woman doctor cites in a message to Ahmad Bahgat, a veteran Egyptian columnist with the Cairo‑based Al‑Ahrarn newspaper, statistics as having exhibited that estimated ten million women and girls live on their own in Egypt. She further quotes the survey as classifying those women and girls as either divorcees, widows without or with children (who later grew up and embarked on their own lives alone), or girls who have not been married before.

 She wonders whether anybody can imagine the magnitude of tragedy that those lonely women have to experience. They cannot maintain balanced relations with others, but they are distraught with tension, anxiety and a deep desire to remain isolated away from curious eyes, forked tongues and pre‑determined charges of snatching husbands from friends, one's kith and kin or neighbors.

 This all leads to depression, rejection of life and inability to be properly woven into the society's fabric. The doctor is raising the alarm that those unmarried women are more susceptible to psychologi6al as well as physical diseases, suc4 as migraine, hypertension, arthritis, stomach and duodenal ulcers, irritable colon, menstruation disorders, loss of hair and moral perversity, with many of them having ultimately to marry an already‑married man.[11]

 Ironically enough, some Western nations where women alarmingly outnumber men have had to approve polygamy as the only alternative to an imminent irreversible social explosion which they can neither deal with nor cope with its deadly fallout. This happens against a background of Muslims only in the name drumming up war against the validity and legitimacy of polygamy.

 Dr. Muhammad Youssef Moussa, an Egyptian celebrated university professor and intellectual in the first half of this century, tells a relevant story whose scene was an international youth conference in 1948 in Germany's Munich city. At the invitation of the conference organizers, Dr. Mohamed Youssef Moussa and one of his colleagues attended a seminar at the aforesaid conference. The major theme of the seminar was a post‑World War II problem in Europe of having women outnumbering men by several fold. Having exhaustively dealt with all solutions proposed by Western participants, the seminar turned them all down, branding them as falling largely short of remedying the immensely difficult problem. Thus far, neither Dr. Youssef Moussa nor his colleague had asked for the floor to address the seminar. Addressing the seminar, they called for the only natural alternative,

Namely adopting polygamy. The Islam‑orientated standpoint was first astonishingly and sneeringly greeted. However, having thoroughly, fairly and prudently mulled over the view, researchers attending the conference ended up approving the Islamic solution to the problem, as the one and only solution, and adopting it as a conference recommendation. Only one year later, residents of then West Germany's city Bonn, were widely reported by the press and news agencies as demanding the German constitution to feature an article allowing polygamy. Hence, Allah manifests what is right despite seculars' unwillingness.[12]

 With the system of polygamy having been in place for centuries, Muslim communities have managed to survive countless evils and misfortunes. A comparison simply struck between societies in Saudi Arabia, for example, and the US will show moral crimes ‑ such as rape and prostitution ‑ as rarely taking place in the former, as against mistresses far in excess of wives in the latter, with illegitimately‑born children accounting for more than 45% of births in the US annually. In accordance with official US statistics, illegitimate children had not exceeded 88 thousand infants by 1938, climbing to 202 thousand infants by 1957, to 250 thousand by 1958 and then skyrocketing to millions of infants born outside wedlock. However, real figures usually tend to be, by a long chalk, far more than official figures released by governments and whoever knows the other hidden parts of the situation.

 In view of all this, France's celebrated man of letters Atienne Denez once wondered, "Is a ban on polygamy morally useful?

He answers himself by saying, "This is highly skeptical, as prostitution, happening once in a blue moon in most Islamic nations, will be going widely rampant, sending immensely destructive fallout everywhere. Women will largely remain bachelor girls, entailing a great deal of corruption, along those nations banning polygamy”.[13]

Chapter Five

POLYGAMY NOT LEFT UNCONTROLLED

Allah, Exalted be He, said, "If you fear that you shall not be able to deal justly with orphans, marry women of your choice, two or three or four; But if you fear that you shall not be able to deal justly (with them), then only one, or (a captive) that your right hands possess. That will be more suitable, to head you off from doing injustice”.[14]

 Interpreting this verse which allowed polygamy, Ibn‑Qatheer said, "If anyone of you has in his custody a female orphan to whom he feared that he should not give mahr (marriage portion) equal to those who are similar to her, he should then do her justice by turning to another woman; Allah has created so many women that he will not be in a loss for one or ones. [15]

 Imam Al Bukhari reported ‑ authoritatively – Urwa, son of Al‑Zubair, as having asked his maternal aunt Aisha, may Allah be pleased with her, about this verse. She replied by saying, "My nephew, the verse refers to a female orphan who, as being kept in custody, shares her money with her guardian. With her money or beauty tickling his fancy, her guardian wishes to marry her without doing her justice (to give her a mahr equal to the one that would have otherwise been paid to others similar to her).

 So, a guardian with such a female orphan in his custody has been forbidden to marry her unless he deals with her on a par with any other woman who is not in his custody by granting her the maximum mahr he would otherwise have given to an equivalent woman. A guardian, in such a position, has been ordered, fearing injustice, to marry as many as maximally four women whom he desires, apart from those female orphans under his protection".

 Abu‑Jaafar Muhammad son of Jareer, in his elucidation of the same verse, reported Rabi'aa as saying, "Allah, Exalted be He, ordered his worshippers to leave those female orphans in their custody for any other four women whom Allah has maximally allowed". Abu‑Jaffar has reported other (jurists) as saying, "Marry maximally four stranger women whom Allah has allowed you to marry. In case you fear not dealing fairly with more than one of those strangers, you have either to content yourselves with only one wife or with those female captives in your right hands".

 Other jurists said, as still reported by Abu‑Jaafar, "The verse can even be explained as forbidding marrying in excess of four woman so that orphans funds may not be depleted by guardians. A tribesman of Quraish used ‑ in pre‑Islamic times ‑ to marry to the tune of ten women, or more or less of women. Having exhaustively spent his money on his ten wives and thus become a destitute, such a tribesman of Quraish would head for the funds of the orphans in his custody to splurge out on his wives or on marrying new ones. Therefore, Allah has forbidden such a practice".[16]

 Al‑Imarn Al‑Nasafy, another great interpreter of the Holy Quran, said, "As reported, men in pre‑Islamic times felt free to commit adultery, but never felt as free to take orphans in their custody. So, Allah told them if you do not really feel free to take orphans in your custody, fearing injustice to them, you had better fear adultery, from which you should keep your genitals by marrying women whom Allah has allowed you to marry and never hover around Allah's forbidden things. Or they did not feel free to take wealthy orphans in their custody, whereas giving themselves an absolutely free hand to keep as many wives as possible, although when they are more than four wives they are more prone to gross inequality being done to them. It is as if Allah were telling them: if you feel hand‑tied to keep orphans in your custody, you should not feel free to do the many wives you keep injustice either; should you fear unfairness as possibly being meted out to those wives, content yourselves with only one wife or, otherwise, take as many female captive slaves possible, so that you may not treat any wife unjustly".[17]

The meaning carried by Allah's saying in the verse you fear" is as follows:

If you think you will not, most probably, mete out fairness to the orphan, or orphans, you have in your custody, you have to "swerve" from her to another one. In this context, a control over having many wives is not imperative. In other words, even a guardian who does not fear doing injustice to orphans, he may have more than one wife (second, third or fourth wife) thus doing just as the one who exactly fears injustice.[18]    Allowing polygamy is a general ruling, which applies to all Muslims, with strings attached. As for what Allah said in the same verse "that will be more suitable to head you off from doing injustice", it simply means as the verse says "To head off from injustice", rather than (as others have unsuccessfully interpreted it) "the least not to have so many offspring" (The Arabic word used by Allah in the verse can mean “not to do injustice" or “not to have so many offspring"). Al‑Tabary reported, citing Ibn‑Abbas, Mujahid and Ibn‑Omar, that the Arabic controversial word referred to assuredly means "injustice" and "slanting". The sense of the controversial Arabic word is not "The least not to be poor" either, as the entire sense of the verse does not go right as such. What is widely believed, by Islamic jurists, to be right is "Not to do injustice or to be slanted against what is right".

Never In Excess of Four Wives At One Time

Allah has licensed a Muslim man to marry from one up to four wives, as drawn from the very wording of the verse of the surah of "Al‑Nisaa" (women) and widely‑acknowledged sayings of the great interpreters of the Holly Quran. A Muslim husband cannot have in excess of four wives at the same time; if he fears that he is highly likely not to deal with them on a par with each other, in case of more than one wife, he should content himself with only one. The rule of not doing any injustice applies to a husband of three wives: fearing injustice he should reduce them to only two; a husband of three fearing injustice if he gets a fourth one should content himself with only the three wives he already has.

Wise Shari'aa even bans monogamy if the husband is fearful of doing his only wife injustice. Great Islam is keenly interested in administering justice under all circumstances.

There is consensus among jurists that a Muslim husband may not combine in excess of four wives.[19]    If Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him, has combined nine wives at one time, this exclusively applies to him; no other Muslim should be analogous to the Prophet.

In the following lines, we will be elaborating on the reason and circumstances leading him (peace be upon him) to marry every one of those wives in order to clarify any relevant confusion or misunderstanding as well as to refute lies mongered by orientalists and Jews alike.

Al‑Imam Al‑Shafii, may Allah be pleased with him, said in his collection of authentic hadiths, "The Prophet's sunna, elaborately explaining what Allah has set forth in general in the Quran, has clarified beyond the slightest doubt that it was Prophet Muhammad alone who was empowered to keep wives in excess of four."

Some Shiite jurists have said that a Muslim husband may combine up to nine wives, interpreting the relevant verse of "Al‑Nisaa" surah as follows: (two + three + four = nine)!! Another queer and unaccepted opinion says that a Muslim husband may combine 18 wives, interpreting two as 2 + 2, three as 3 + 3, and four as 4 + 4, all totaling 18 wives.

However, the very wording of sunna as well as the deeds of companions and followers categorically denote that a Muslim husband may have access only to four wives. Sunni jurists, predecessor and descendants alike, have unanimously agreed that it was exclusively the Prophet who was allowed to have more than four wives.

We refer our readers to the hadiths previously cited in chapter one of this book, including that reported by Imam Al‑Bukhari (also reported by Malik, Nasa'i and Daraqutni) that Ghilan of the Thaqif tribe had ten wives when he embraced Islam. Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him, said to him: "Keep only any four of them you desire and divorce the rest." Another hadith has also been previously cited in chapter one of this book. It is that hadith reported by Abu.‑Dawoud citing Harith son of Qais of the Asad tribe as saying, "When I embraced Islam I had eight wives.  When I so told the Prophet, he said: Keep only four of them."[20]

Ibn‑Katheer, elucidating the verse of the Quran having to do with polygamy, saying, "Allah says marry as many wives as two, three or four if you so wish. Allah, Exalted be He, said (Who made the angels messengers with wings ‑ two, or three, or four), [21] '(2) that is to say that some of those angels have two wings, some have three wings while others have four wings. The context here is that of Allah, the Benefactor, mentioning His boons that He has endowed upon His worshippers, and telling them what He has allowed them to do. So, if Allah had allowed men to combine more than four wives, He would have made it clear in the Quran.[22]

Al‑Imarn Al‑Qurtubi, refuting the alleged permission for men to marry more than four wives, has said, "Those who so claim do neither understand the Quran nor the sunna at all, abandoning what the Muslim nation's ancestors firmly believed in. They claimed that the conjunction ('And) in the relevant verse is an all‑combining one. In fact, it is the jurists who belong to the sect of Rafida, or Rafidites (certain offshoots of Shiite), and some of those associated with the sect of Zahirites (a certain Islamic sect adopting the opinion of taking religious judgments directly from Quran and sunna texts as they are on the surface, even literally, regardless of whatever details, explanations or restrictions jurists of other schools of jurisprudence may have concluded) who have made that highly‑ignorant claim. Some others have gone further to a much worse stretch by alleging that Allah has licensed men to combine eighteen wives. This all is an example of gross ignorance of both language and sunna alike, and flouts the nation's consensus as well, as none of the Prophet's companions or followers who came in subsequent ages was heard of as having married more than four wives."

Having cited all the Prophet's hadiths in which he ordered companions to keep only any four of the wives they had and to divorce the ones in excess thereof, Al‑Qurtubi[23] has stressed that combining nine wives at a time was an exclusively special thing of the Prophet, peace be upon him, with divine direction to fulfil certain objectives for the good of the call and message itself. Then, Al‑Qurtubi has said, "Allah, Exalted be He, has addressed Arabs in the plainest Arabic style. Arabs, eloquent as they were, never said two and three and four when they mean "nine." Arabs completely disagree of an Arab saying: give somebody four, six and eight instead of out rightly saying eighteen. The conjunction "And" in the gracious verse (Two and three and four wives) simply means :instead of two you may marry three, and instead of three you may marry four wives." "If he gets a fifth wife, the marriage spontaneously turns null and void and is even punishable, though scholars have assumed diverse positions on this," Al‑Qurtubi further said. In reply to a question why Allah has not used the conjunction "Or" in the verse instead of "And," Al‑Qurtubi has said, "If (or) had been used, the verse would have meant that a husband of two may not take a third wife, and that a husband of three may not take a fourth one, while all this is permitted.

Capability to Practice Polygamy

 As mentioned before, having access to polygamy primarily hinges upon capability. Just as marrying the first wife, marrying a second, third or fourth wife requires financial, health as well as psychological capability. In the lack of capability, polygamy is, automatically, not allowed. He who cannot provide for two households has to suffice himself with only one wife at the center of only one household. A husband of two should content himself with the two unless he is capable, in terms of both finance and health, of keeping a third or fourth wife, and so on.

 By finance we mean solvency to provide for the children by the wife, or wives, kept.

 Health capability, in our opinion, is the ability to satisfy sexual desires of the wives kept, as its imperative on the husband to cuter for the legitimate and natural sexual desires of his wife or wives. By so doing, he helps his wife, or wives, to be sexually chaste. If the husband is sexually impotent, for example, he is not envisaged as having any wife, even a single one, as this does her gross injustice. We also believe that a husband, or them, sexually potent for only one wife should not have more wives because he is thus doing her injustice, making marriage grossly disadvantageous to her. However, every individual case has to be considered independently of others. A husband's conscience, self‑honesty and religious scruple are apt to dissuade him from inequality to his wife or wives. If, notwithstanding, a husband insists on having a wife or wives whom he is not able to adequately and reasonably satisfy her sexually, the wife (or wives) thus kept has perfect right to proceed against him demanding a divorce on grounds of detriment and a fear of having illegal sexual affair. A court judge is broadly empowered to assess the magnitude of detriment in every individual case.

 As to psychological capability, it means an ability to administer justice to the wives kept, in terms of everything available, without showing any slant towards one wife, or his children by her, against the other wife, or wives or his children by her or them.

In the absence of any of the three capability prerequisites cited above, polygamy is not, by any means, allowed.

Justice Among Wives

 Allah, Exalted be He, says in the third verse of "Al‑Nisaa" surah, "But if you fear that you shall not be able to deal justly, then only one."[24]     Allah, Exalted be He, also says