Mu' meneen Brothers and Sisters,

As Salaam Aleikum wa Rahmatullahi wa Barakatuh.  (May Allah's Peace, Mercy and Blessings be upon all of you)

One of our brothers/sisters has asked this question:

why we don't accept the fact that this was because of the societal need at that time. war and travel in addition to the less survival of the men made such, polygamy a factor in establishing stability to the society.

(There may be some grammatical and spelling errors in the above statement. The forum does not change anything from questions, comments and statements received from our readers for circulation in confidentiality.)

Answer:

Polygamy because of war

In the name of Allah, We praise Him, seek His help and ask for His forgiveness. Whoever Allah guides none can misguide, and whoever He allows to fall astray, none can guide them aright. We bear witness that there is no one (no idol, no person, no grave, no prophet, no imam, no dai, nobody!) worthy of worship but Allah Alone, and we bear witness that Muhammad(saws) is His slave-servant and the seal of His Messengers.

My beloved brother, firstly, it is not a ‘fact’ that polygamy was practiced and allowed in Islam because of the societal needs at the time of the Revelation of the Quran! Secondly, Allah did not ‘command’ the believing men to practice polygamy; He only gave ‘permission’ to the believing men to practice polygamy, if they wished to do so.

And there is a big difference between a command and a permission! The believing men are given permission by Allah Subhanah to eat of all the halaal foods; but that does not mean that a believer ‘must’ eat each and every halaal food! The believers are given permission, so they may eat of the halaal foods if they wish to do so. Similarly, if one wishes to marry more than one woman upto a maximum of four, he has been given permission by Allah Subhanah to do so.

Besides, Islam did not start the practice of polygamy! It was a practice that has been practiced since time immemorial! Islam, in fact, put a limit to the number of wives a believing man may keep at one time to a maximum of four.

It is indeed a widely held notion that Islam ‘introduced’ the concept of polygamy because of the societal needs at the time of the Revelation of the Quran; but there is absolutely no truth to this notion. At the time of the Messenger of Allah (saws), most men had in excess of four wives in keeping with tradition and culture. When the verse of Surah Nisaa was revealed in Medina limiting the maximum number of wives for a believing man to four, many believers who had wives in excess of four had to divorce them. Thus, the notion that because men used to die in battles, and thus Islam allowed the practice of polygamy only to marry the excess women to stabilize the imbalance is absolutely baseless and illogical.

No religion in the world has a ceiling in their texts to the number of wives one may keep at any one time, except Islam; and no religion in the world has guided their followers to keep only ‘one’ wife, if they wished to do so, except Islam!

Whatever written of Truth and benefit is only due to Allah’s Assistance and Guidance, and whatever of error is of me. Allah Alone Knows Best and He is the Only Source of Strength.

Your Brother in Islam,

Burhan