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Muslim women marrying Christian men impossible? They did in eighteenth-century India.
I’m watching Who Do You Think You Are with Alistair McGowan. From the BBC site:
With the assistance of a local historian, Alistair finds a reference to Suetonius McGowan in a religious pamphlet. He learns that Suetonius [of Irish descent] married a noble Muslim lady, whose name was omitted from the baptism record because she refused to convert to Christianity. And thus the mystery is solved: here is the Indian link that Alistair had felt sure he would find. He does have Indian blood after all.
Here are the interesting factoids from the show. When the British colonised India in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, the men were encouraged to take Indian wives to cement the British hold on the area. The Anglo-Indians (people of mixed race, North-West European with at least one Indian female ancestor) tended to marry among themselves, and they took British culture, names, dress, and were Christians.
Nevertheless, there were at least some Muslims who agreed to marry their daughters to British–and Christian–men. The reason, is because Alistair’s female Indian ancestor was a noblewoman (the Muslims in that area were landowners in that time). She would have required her father’s consent for marriage. So interracial and more importantly inter-religious marriages between Muslim women and Christian men seem to have been considered possible.
This is contrary to the present widespread view that marriage between a Muslim woman and any type of non-Muslim man is (and always has) been completely prohibited. What were the religious scholars of that time and place saying about such interreligious marriages? I would be fascinated to know.
I have long suspected the scholarly censure of interreligious marriage, came out of the notion that to marry your daughter to a non-Muslim would be to set up an unequal relationship implying the woman in a higher position than her husband (i.e. non-Muslims not carrying the same status as Muslims), but I imagine in colonized India, where non-Muslims were in a higher position of status this may not have been a problem, hence a Muslim nobleman and land-owner giving permission for his daughter to marry a British Christian. Fascinating!!
[Update: it turns out Suetonious was a non-trinitarian Christian–a follower of Swedenborg–who respected the Muslims rather than being a missionary trying to convert them. Gosh sometimes I wish I was a historian, this is fascinating stuff.]
Tags: Fiqh, interfaith, interreligious marriage, Muslim Feminism
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May 28th, 2008 at 12:50 am
Asalaamu alaikum.
I would respectfully disagree with you ukhti and say that the reason Muslim women cannot marry non-Muslim men is in fact a protection for the Muslim woman. A non-Muslim man is not capable of fulfilling a Muslim woman’s rights, and is easily able to fall back on his own culture as an excuse to not give her her rights as a Muslim wife. How many Christian men offer an appropriate mahr? How many allow their wives to raise their children in Islamic knowledge and practice without undermining it? How many will even respect her to wear hijab or to allow her to fast Ramadan? Nevermind that they cannot provide her Islamic education and support. I have never known a Muslim woman married to a non-Muslim man who did not become a non-practicing Muslim because of it, and I have known many.
“Do not marry unbelieving women (idolaters), until they believe: *A slave woman who believes is better than an unbelieving woman, even though she allures you. Nor marry (your girls) to unbelievers until they believe: A man slave who believes is better than an unbeliever, even though he allures you. Unbelievers do (but) beckon you to the Fire.* But Allah
beckons by His Grace to the Garden (of bliss) and forgiveness, and makes His Signs clear to mankind: That they may celebrate His praise.” Qur’an Surah 2:221
(emphasis mine)
Just because something was allowed to occur in our history does not make it right, nor should we assume that the scholars of the time didn’t speak against it. It really sounds more like families caring more about the comforts of this life than about their daughter’s attainment of the Hereafter. Allahu alim.
May 28th, 2008 at 1:15 am
Assalamu ‘alaykum ukhti
I’m not really arguing whether it’s right or wrong - that’s an question I’ve struggled over for years, but it’s the social attitudes that I am finding fascinating. In terms of community attitudes, I think attitudes about interreligious marriage are not quite as black and white as is often assumed. What I find fascinating is that this complexity in attitudes is not just a modern phenomenon (as the show demonstrates). I guess it’s the sociologist and historian in me coming out.
We know in the Fatawa Alamgiri there is a provision against Muslims marrying their daughters to Muslim converts because of kafaa (on the basis of inequality), so it’s not a far stretch to argue the same type of thinking would have been there for non-Muslims.
The sociologist in me, wants to know whether religious scholars of the day were/were not applying the same types of arguments as you’ve reproduced above to dissuade from interreligious marriage. (And if not, why and *how* were they being ignored?)
Given the population of Anglo-Indians (and of course they wouldn’t have all been with a Muslim woman ancestor, as Muslims were a minority in India) there has to have been some discussion on the topic.
We do know in Indonesia where a Muslim woman is married to a non-Muslim man, the children are statistically *more* likely to retain Muslim adherence than where the Muslim is the father:
And the question of her rights implies there is a religious court system in play. In a Western context (for example), where there is a secular court system, traditional shar’i rulings don’t apply even if she’s married to a Muslim man. In fact we already have a problem where there are a minority of Muslim men taking advantage of their shar’i rights and not respecting Muslim womens rights i.e. in polygynous situations, and Muslim women having no legal recourse to sue because the Western system doesn’t recognise shari`a law. I’ve got a friend who had a nikah and then her husband up and divorced her within a few weeks without paying her the mahr.
As for a Muslim woman married to a non-Muslim man in such a setting, what rights can’t she exercise that would not also apply to a Muslim man? A non-practising Muslim man can prevent a Muslim woman from practising her religion (wearing hijab, raising the children Muslim etc.). Furthermore, if she sets up her prenup right (being devil’s advocate) then how is she not protected with a mahr, and her various stipulations for what she needs?
As for levels of religiosity in interreligious marriages, I’d have to see the data to suggest that it is causative not correlative (i.e. I’d hazard a guess and say that given the stigma against interreligious marriages, that religiously observant Muslim women would be far less likely to enter an interreligious marriage than an already partially or completely non-observant Muslim woman).
May 28th, 2008 at 2:23 am
Asalaamu alaikum.
I’m not at all implying that all Muslim men do give a Muslim wife her rights, as we know there are cases where men don’t. My point is that it is guaranteed that a non-Muslim man will not and CAN NOT give her her rights because he does not accept them as such to begin with, and often is completely unaware of her rights. The simple reality of these marriages is the Muslim women give up their rights when they marry a non-Muslim man. And then they cannot expect later to ask for any of their rights back. Whereas with a Muslim man, she can certainly push for any of her rights she desires at any point, with a non-Muslim he says “you knew what you were getting when you married me”. Nor am I implying a Muslim court system at play: I am simply talking about the basic relationship. A Muslim man is more likely to meet her rights because they are both aware of what they are, regardless of court related issues, and sometimes community can play a role in helping to enforce this. A non-Muslim man has no reason whatsoever to care about her rights: he never accepted that she had rights to begin with. She cannot go to her imam or anyone in the community and ask for help in securing anything from a non-Muslim husband because no one is going to be very sympathetic to her stupid choice.
I agree with you that it is the not-so-practicing Muslim woman who will marry a non-Muslim man to begin with, but with time should she decide she wants to practice the reality is that a non-Muslim husband will not allow her to do so. I know of too many women in that situation. Later, when they want to wear hijab he will not let her. When they want to take classes, he will not let her, and certainly he won’t help to pay for it (which is her right). There is practically speaking no such thing as a non-Muslim man who pays all the essential bills and will allow her to choose whether or not she works and allow her to keep her own money all to herself. Is it true that some Muslim men would do the same thing? Certainly. But the difference is that she can push for her rights against a Muslim man and do what she feels is best for her deen. Against a non-Muslim man, she must accept her lot because she chose to marry someone who she knew would never accept that part of her. With community and family pressure, she might force a Muslim man to see to her rights or to divorce and have other options. With a non-Muslim man, there is no pressure on him at all and a good chance that no one will wish to help her if she does divorce him.
I don’t know how it is in Australia, but many courts here in the U.S. do accept a written contract for mahr as valid. Not that I personally recommend going through our court system to secure rights if there is another means to do so, and that is the crux right there: if you marry a non-Muslim, there is no other means to secure any rights. If you marry a Muslim, you have some options within your community regardless of the legal system, and for some things you can fall back on the legal system. Other than polygyny, in our courts you can fight for money owed for rent and utilities simply by having a written document signed by each of you that he agrees to pay these things or to pay half of them. You can sue for child support whether your marriage was legally recognized or not.
May 28th, 2008 at 5:12 am
Salaam ‘Alaikum
The upper classes always have and probably always will do things that are against the accepted norms of the society at large and in conflict with the teachings and laws of the dominant religion. This doesn’t surprise me any more than the fact that adultery was rampant among the European aristocracy at the same time that burgeois and peasant women were jailed and worse for the same behavior because it was against Church teachings (sometimes with those aristocratic men).
May 28th, 2008 at 8:11 am
Esselamun aleykum… I think we can all agree that Muslims are encouraged to marry Muslims, though men are given limited permission (and it’s not encouraged) to marry observant people of the Book.
Seems to me that Islam only prevents ‘religiously observant’ Muslim men from behaving in an un-Islamic way in regards to a Muslim woman’s rights. (Born Muslims too often don’t struggle hard enough against un-Islamic cultural practices, in my opinion.)
But it also seems to me that a man, Muslim or not, could respect a Muslim woman’s rights if it was in his nature to do so.
I think it’s interesting that there’s a historical example of Muslim women marrying non-Muslim men. There’s probably historical examples of all sorts of ‘taboos’. Being naturally subversive (how else can an American convert to Islam?), I can’t help but grin.
May 28th, 2008 at 12:09 pm
“But it also seems to me that a man, Muslim or not, could respect a Muslim woman’s rights if it was in his nature to do so.”
Asalaamu alaikum.
Uh, no, respectfully, he can NOT. The man is the head of the household and the wife must be able to follow him. A Muslim woman cannot follow a non-Muslim husband. It is a Muslim woman’s right to have a husband who can lead her and it is IMPOSSIBLE for a non-Muslim man to do so. He cannot lead her in salat, he cannot properly in accordance with her rights support her in her deen (if he is a good man, he can support her so far, but as a non-Muslim he is not able to support her up to her right of support and encouragement due from her husband), he cannot educate her in any way in relation to her deen and being willing to pay someone else to do so only meets a portion of her rights. A Muslim woman has the right to a home that is run on the Shariah and the Sunnah, and a non-Muslim husband cannot give her that at all.
If all we think that “matters” of our rights is financial obligation and freedom to do what we want, fine, a really good non-Muslim man might be willing to do that (though I’ve never met one who was). But that is not the limit of a woman’s rights from her husband. The more important rights that a woman has are simply not possible for a non-Muslim man to give her because he doesn’t have them to give.
May 28th, 2008 at 4:49 pm
Assalamu alaikoum,
No situation is perfect sister Aaminah.
“If all we think that “matters” of our rights is financial obligation and freedom to do what we want, fine, a really good non-Muslim man might be willing to do that (though I’ve never met one who was). But that is not the limit of a woman’s rights from her husband. The more important rights that a woman has are simply not possible for a non-Muslim man to give her because he doesn’t have them to give.”
This is very true (except that I have met one or more(non-Mus man) who is), but in some situations, things like being led in the prayer by one’s husband, or encouraged in the deen, may be something the woman is prepared to forego, if there are other matters of more priority.
For example, a woman converts to Islam but wishes to remain with her non-Muslim husband, and the father of her children, in other words wants to keep a good family whole) and he will in no way stand in the way of her education in faith, and educating their children in faith, and will, and does support this. Allah
knows best, but considering her other option may be to be unmarried, in which case she would receive absolutely none of the rights of a married woman, is it not possible that she choose to forego some of them, and in doing so protect an existing family? Considering family is sacred in Islam.
Now this is quite a common situation in the West, and this has a lot to do with gender attitudes that make it not implausible to a man that his wife may not want to follow his beliefs and that he actually accepts this graciously.
I do wonder about this issue as it doesn’t seem as clear cut to me as you have expressed. But I am aware that legally, your position is the correct one. Allahu Alim.
May 28th, 2008 at 4:51 pm
when I say “other matters of more priority”, I mean that if at the same time, the sister knows that she has the strength to follow through with her convictions without her husbands guidance, and conversion is in itself a pretty good indicator that she has that strength of faith.
May 28th, 2008 at 9:11 pm
Asalaamu alaikum.
Dear sister Saha,
We are not discussing situations where a woman converts and is already married to a non-Muslim man. We are discussing Muslim women who CHOOSE to marry a non-Muslim man, and in that case it IS quite clear cut. You are changing the subject in order to make a point that is completely irrelevent to the actual post and description of Muslim women taking non-Muslim husbands.
For the sake of argument however, a convert woman staying with a non-Muslim husband is also not considered a valid marriage. While I wholeheartedly believe on a very personal level that she might do so while making du’a for him to become a Muslim as well, the reality is that she cannot live with him indefinitely and he is not capable of meeting all of her needs as a Muslim no matter how good he is. And yes, you describe a woman “forgoing her rights”. That is EXACTLY what I am talking about - you admit that a Muslim women would have to forgo her rights to remain with a non-Muslim men. You cannot have it both ways, saying “yes, a non-Muslim man can give her her rights” and simultaneously saying “she can choose to forgo her rights”.
One of her rights is to a believing and practicing Muslim husband. It is impossible to argue that a non-Muslim is meeting her rights when he obviously cannot give her that.
But again, what I see here is alot of attempt to make excuses to disobey Allah
, excuses for why it is easier to take a non-Muslim husband and why that “might” be valid. Above I posted a verse of the Qur’an. It is quite explicit and says that a believing woman cannot be given to a non-believing man. Those are Allah 
’s words, not mine.
May 28th, 2008 at 9:18 pm
The debate here between different commenters is quite interesting. But there’s one thing I really don’t understand, why would a woman need a man to guide her spiritually? Aren’t women intelligent and sensible enough to make those decisions? It is unfair to say only a pious man will be able to guide them in such matters.
I know far too many Muslim women who are not only pious, observant in their practices and have an in-depth of knowledge of faith but are married to Muslim men who are not at all practicing and some times not at all supportive. On the other hand, I’ve met non-Muslim men who are very supportive of their wives’ lifestyles.
I might be wrong, but in my experience, a woman does not need a man to follow in matters of the faith.
May 29th, 2008 at 4:35 am
Assalamu ‘alaykum,
I know this can be a very passionate issue, so I am heartened by the respectful dialogue.
The Qur’an prohibits marriage to the muskhrikun (polytheists) and kufar (ingrate truth-concealers), which is not the same thing as saying non-Muslim. This is because the Qur’an does speak of righteous people who do not carry the socio-historical label of Muslim i.e. the hanif, “those who believe in Allah
and the Last Day and do good”, the righteous from ahl al-kitab. (It also speaks of bad people who do carry the label Muslim i.e. the munafiq).
So the question I find myself asking - is if the Qur’an describes categories of people based on their descriptors (i.e. a kafir does X, a munafiq does Y, a hanif does A, a muslim (in the generic sense) does B etc.) then I think it is more complex than simply dividing the world up into Muslim/non-Muslim.
So, if we take a righteous Christian who believes in Allah
, the Last Day and lives a righteous life, how can we say that he is worse than a munafiq who might accept Islam outwardly but whose soul is corrupted?
As for the man being more spiritually mature than the woman, we have precedents in the lives of the Salaf al-Sahlihin where the wife was more knowledgeable and pious than the husband. For example, in Suyuti’s appendix of Women Sufis, there is the tale of one woman who divorced her husband because she saw he did not pray the two superogoratory rakat upon entering the masjid!
I think the most you can say, is that the reason why Muslim women may not marry non-Muslim men is because that is the traditional consensus. Which brings me back to the original point, which is *was* there consensus? What were the scholars of 18th century India saying about these marriages which obviously took place.
May 29th, 2008 at 6:46 am
Whether marriages between Muslim women and Christian men were/are accepted by some, it’s still Islamically unacceptable. Islam is clear about this issue. So whoever goes against this has overstepped the mark.
May 29th, 2008 at 10:16 am
Asalaamu alaikum.
“a righteous Christian”
Well, first of all it is necessary to understand that there is no such thing as a Christian who doesn’t believe in the trinity now, which therefore means they are committing shirk. So they are not as “righteous” as one might hope.
No, women don’t “need” men in order to be righteous and pious themselves. I never said that I need a man to make me a good woman. I said it is a Muslim woman’s RIGHT to have such a husband. We were discussing a woman’s rights and no one has yet mentioned how it is possible for a Muslim woman to be married to a non-Muslim man without giving up some of her rights. It is, in my opinion, better to be an unmarried woman than to be with a man who is incapable of and uninterested in maintaining my rights. The best in character of non-Muslim men is still NOT anywhere near the level of character that I expect in a husband, or have the right to.
And no, Umm Yasmin, your splitting hairs with the terms doesn’t actually matter in this particular case because the verse I quoted above says not to marry women to “nonbelievers”. I don’t know Arabic, so perhaps someone can explain the actual Arabic term used, but it is commonly translated and understood as “nonbelievers” and there is no doubt whatsoever to me that means non-Muslim. I don’t care how good a man is, if he isn’t Muslim, he isn’t good enough.
Thank you, Salma. I really thought that quoting the above verse would make it pretty simple. I don’t even think anyone here really believes that it is acceptable, so I can’t understand why anyone would argue in favor of it just for the sake of the debate.
I appreciate that the debate has been respectful, but it is still disheartening because we shouldn’t debate just for the fun of arguing. Taking the “devil’s advocate” side against what has been a very clearly articulated and long-standing, as well as perfectly logical, stance on this issue doesn’t make sense to me. Why argue for the right to marry someone who Allah
has made unacceptable to us? Do we think we know better than He what we need? Every argument brought against mine has been purely nafs “but maybe I want” style, and I just find the tendency of Muslims to think that’s okay really sad.
May 29th, 2008 at 11:15 am
Selam aleykum Aaminah,
A point of clarification. Respectfully, there are Christians who don’t believe in the trinity… Unitarians, Quakers, Jehovah’s Witnesses, etc. I myself was a nondenominational Christian who had private doubts about the trinity that ultimately ballooned into outright defiance against the doctrine. Though perhaps ‘orthodox’ Christians would not consider them co-religionists, it must be noted that there are self-proclaimed Christians who are not committing shirk. The Qur’an tells us that the closest to us, the Muslims, are true Christians, because among them are men of piety and men of learning. The lexicon of the Qur’an does not put People of the Book in the same category as unbelievers.
Truth be told, the reason I cannot take an adamant stance on the issue is because a relative of mine recently converted to Islam secretly and she prays every day her husband will, too. (I pray for them, and encourage her to “out” herself all the time. Beyond that, I’m not sure what my role would be.)
I am not sure the first duty of the Muslim is to define orthodoxy. Isn’t our first duty to be so loving, so tolerant that our hearts are as wide as the ocean, so that other people might stop and say, ‘Elhamdulillah!’?
May 29th, 2008 at 2:32 pm
Assalamu ‘alaykum,
“Well, first of all it is necessary to understand that there is no such thing as a Christian who doesn’t believe in the trinity now, which therefore means they are committing shirk. So they are not as “righteous” as one might hope.”
But ukhtee that’s just not true as Jennifer points out. Aside from the fact that there were Christians who clearly believed in the Trinity at the time the Qur’an addressed them (the scholars never insisted on unitarianism as a qualifier to allow a Muslim man to marry a chaste and righteous Christian woman).
“The best in character of non-Muslim men is still NOT anywhere near the level of character that I expect in a husband, or have the right to.”
Ahh, I think that’s the nub of it.
I know honourable and righteous non-Muslims and I just cannot accept the Qur’an teaches - and in fact I really believe it does not teach - that they are lesser human beings than men who might outwardly carry the label Muslim but not much else. Otherwise, aren’t we guilty of the very same thing the Qur’an warns the Jews and Christians not to do - claim exclusive salvation:
The Qur’an does talk about Jews and Christians who have been guilty of disobeying their covenant with God, but it *also* speaks of righteous Jews and Christians:
To put it in stark contrast - can we *really* say that Usama bin Laden is better than Nelson Mandela and keep a straight face?
I’m sorry you think we’re just debating something for the fun of it - I assure you I do not see it that way. Mostly because it is a sociological reality that there are Muslim women who choose to marry non-Muslims, or who are converts and are married to non-Muslims. That there appear to be Muslims in the past who were more accommodating of such relationships–whatever we think of them today–I think is worthy of study.
May 30th, 2008 at 4:08 am
I think the maxim one man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter works beautifully when applied to the ’stark contrast’ you pose, Um Yasmin.
Maybe someone other than Mandela would be appropriate.
May 30th, 2008 at 4:41 am
Actually maybe it’s a good match, precisely because Mandela fought a jihad (to use Islamic terminology) in a very Islamic way.
May 30th, 2008 at 8:20 pm
[…] following is a response I wrote regarding several issues raised within a post by Umm Yasmin on her blog. I have posted it here for several reasons: a) I am not certain that all of the response would go […]
May 30th, 2008 at 8:22 pm
Thank you sister for your post. I have responded to some issues therein within a rather lengthy blog post. For that reason I did not post it here for concern that it would be to long, and thus cumbersome (as it is nearly 7 pages +). I pray that you take the time to read it and offer your responses etc. May Allah
bless you with you good Amin!
http://seekingilm.com/archives/338
May 31st, 2008 at 3:11 am
[…] led my husband to the discussion over at Dervish because I really felt that someone needed to clear up the issue of a Muslim woman marrying a non […]
May 31st, 2008 at 10:23 am
Salaam ‘alaykum dear and thanks for posting this thoughtful entry Umm Yasmin.
In light of the increasing interfaith marriages between American Muslim women and their non-Muslim partners it is a subject worth a scholarly revisit in light of current times, changed gender roles, and cultural contexts.
This is not just happening between “non-practicing” Muslim women and their partners. I personally know of a number of practicing women who have are now in their late 20s/early 30s and who have despaired of finding a Muslim partner. While none of them have married a non-Muslim yet, it is no longer off the table as an option as it once was.
Men in our community have long been allowed to marry Jewish and Christian women without the community or their families emphasizing that a Muslim mate is preferable, or that the non-Muslim woman should be observant in her own faith.
Since 9/11, even many of the practicing urban men I know are specifically ruling out Muslim women who are visibly observant (e.g., hijabis) as potential partners.
In light of all this what are the options for practicing Muslim women? I’m not saying that they should pursue non-Muslim men but I am saying that almost all of the single people I know are Muslim women, while the men either married very young, married from “back home”, married non-Muslims, or prefer a not visibly observant wife. These are the practicing men I’m talking about, not more secular or cultural-minded Muslims.
I personally feel that sharing the same values, religious ones included, are of paramount importance in a marriage. But simply saying that it is not allowed does not deal with the reality of the situation.
I am glad to see that there are at least a few places where the issue is being discussed in a thoughtful and open-minded manner and would love to hear what shayukh who are truly rooted in Islamic learning and Western culture have to say.
Warmly,
Baraka
Some other marriage-related posts at:
Just another angry black Muslim woman?
http://tinyurl.com/5d5stk
and Tariq Nelson
http://tinyurl.com/694f6s
May 31st, 2008 at 1:20 pm
Assalamu ‘alaykum Abu Layth and Baraka, and welcome to the thread.
I am grateful for your considered replies, and I am preparing a response. It’s not an issue I desire to rush headlong into tackling, however it is one that I am being increasingly approached about locally and something I feel needs to have the type of respectful dialogue and discussion that Baraka mentioned, and which I hope is happening here.
I will post shortly inshallah.
June 3rd, 2008 at 9:06 am
So much for practising. The majority of the scholars state it is Makruh (hated) for Muslim Men to marry a kitabi woman, even if she is Muhsina. Furthermore, I would like these men who marry these non-Muslim women to show us how these women are “Muhsina”, a condition laid forth by Allah
in the Qur’an. Some state that Muhsina is a “virgin”, while others state it means she is chaste [العفيفة] - as cited by Ibn Kathir and others.
I don’t know what world they are living in, but last time I checked the christians are committing more zinaa than the apes!
In fact, when I was a christian teen I attended a youth christian rally in Bloomington that was created to stop the rampant fornication occurring in the Christian Communities. I will never forget how many young girls who signed “the pledge” to wait until they were married, went back to their hotels and fornicated with those “christian” young men the very same night they signed the pledge. Chaste? So as I said, so much for religiosity!
June 3rd, 2008 at 11:59 am
Assalamu ‘alaykum akhee, that’s a bit rough. At least here in Australia being an active, practising Christian (as opposed to a census Christian) does mean something.
June 3rd, 2008 at 11:14 pm
Wa’alaykum Salam Sr. UmmYasmin,
I think a good way to determine the “chastity” of a society as a whole is look at the statistics for pregnancy out of wedlock (premarital pregnancies), as well as abortion statistics for Australia. Though it is hard to determine if they are christian, one could statistically argue that the majority of Australia are christian, considering the majority of the country claims christianity in one form or another as their religion (64% in 2006).
Whatever the case, the challenge still stands for the Muslim men who marry Kitabi women to produce proof that they are “muhsina”.
June 4th, 2008 at 12:12 am
Salams again.
Statistically a majority of people put Christian down on the census, but only 19% actually attend church more than twice a month. Of that 19% I think you would find it means something much more in terms of a moral code.
June 4th, 2008 at 12:55 am
It’s interesting to see where virgin comes up in a list of desirable qualities in a prospective wife in “Reliance of the Traveller”, I don’t have a copy on hand, but I seem to remember it being at least number three or four.
June 4th, 2008 at 12:58 am
oh and Umm Yaz, I will be visiting the town called nong on Sunday iA, and would happily make a detour to the hills if you will be home, I will have my unruly horde with me however!
June 4th, 2008 at 2:39 am
May Allah
touch some mens’ hearts because I have written this:
People might say that it is fair for a Muslim convert to marry a Muslim convert, but there can be many inequalities there, for example maybe one is a virgin, and the other slept around a lot before converting to Islam. Also, there is the problem of finding that the Muslim man’s conversion to Islam was just to try a new lifestyle, but is not based on good faith.
Also, there is another problem for the converts: the Muslim men who are not converts usually (99% of the time) prefer a Muslim woman who is from their home their mother country, so that they can share the same cultural background. Also, as a convert, I have found most Muslim men I met very disappointing, especially regarding their passion for their faith. Most Muslim men told me that they were only Muslim because their parents are Muslim, so they were keeping traditions.
Whenever I heard this, my heart would sink.
As Muslim converts, we don’t have parents helping us to find and question potential suitors. We are often too shy and feel too shameful to ask an imam to help us. We know we are prey to many ungodly men, or we discover too late in the process that we were prey.
I don’t want to write this to discourage other Muslim women, especially converts, from looking for a good Muslim man. There are resources available for those who want to try, such as the imam. Go to the IMAM and ask!! If you are really determined to find the best man for you, then us Muslim converts must be more brave in this matter, even though we are young women from a different culture and we are afraid of being shamed.
Ameen.
June 5th, 2008 at 3:31 am
Some really interesting comments here. I have heard the issue of “born” Muslim women having a hard time finding decent men to marry. They are often held to standards that Muslim men are not.
As a convert married to an Arab, I can tell you many Muslim women from traditional Muslim countries have a hard time marrying from a differnt ethnicity/race than their own due to society and family pressures. This limits their choices for marriage.
I think you’ll find that a new trend, one I have seen with my own eyes, is born Muslim women marrying Western guys who “convert” to marry them. So they fulfill the Islamic mandate of marrying a Muslim, but these men are “Muslim” in name only. There are several female bloggers out there from Muslim lands who fall right into their category.
This practice is legion in the Iranian American community here, just as often as not the Iranian women dont even bother to have the man convert. This is a legacy of the secular nature of the Iranian immigrants to the USA.
I have brought this up only to have brothers say that I shouldnt really judge people like this. They say that who knows what God has planned for these men. God brings people to Him in many ways. Maybe they convert for marriage, but come to love the deen. Allah
knows best, the brothers have a good point.
I wanted to make a comment about an Arabic translation:
Makruh (hated)
“Makruh” literally does mean “hated”, but that isnt really how it is used. If it was hated, it would banned. “Makruh” is something which is discouraged. I think there is a difference.
Halal means allowed, Mukruh means discouraged, haram means something is forbidden (hated).
A small list of some things that are mukruh:
http://www.shirazi.org.uk/makruh.htm
There is not agreement as to what is makruh and what is not. Some see smoking as makruh, others see it as haram.
Umm Layth,
Nice article put together by your Hubby, Masha’Allah
.
June 5th, 2008 at 10:44 am
June 7th, 2008 at 5:26 pm
[…] why my posting has slowed down a little). I accidentally come across an interesting paper that is relevant to a comments thread on marital relationships between Muslims and non-Muslims. The paper is “Associations Between […]
July 22nd, 2008 at 1:09 am
It is disbelief to view the marriage of a muslima with a non-muslim man as permissible in Islamic Law. All scholars from different backgrounds agree on this.
July 22nd, 2008 at 10:10 am
Wahhabi?
July 24th, 2008 at 3:20 am
Assalamu Alaykum,
This is a fascinating debate. I find it interesting that other traditions than Islam have been keener to restrict who their daughters marry than who their sons do, and in general to set bounds around who children are permitted or not to marry. In Orthodox Christianity, for instance, marriage is permissible with non-Orthodox Christians (i.e., Protestants and Roman Catholics) if they have been baptized in the name of the much-maligned Trinity. There’s nothing necessarily wrong with all of this, its just a sociological reality, but there is nothing necessarily right with it either unless one believes Allah
ordained it to be so in every exact detail for all time, which apparently many people do believe. My own experience doesn’t convince me, but if groups are to restrict who their daughters (and sons) can or cannot marry, it makes more sense to argue, as Aaminah does in part, from legal grounds about rights, although I remain reserved about her argument, and more so about the assumptions on which she founds that argument, such as the qualitative superiority of the Muslim (even a Munafiq?) over a Christian, who cannot be righteous in her view because of the Trinity.
I am happy, as a Christian who believes in the Trinity, that my Muslim Arabic teacher did not treat me as unclean or as a mushrik. Muslims need to start realizing what the doctrines about the Trinity actually say, and why they were formulated — in part to solve problems related God’s oneness while explaining the kind of salvation that Isa al-Masih was involved in bringing, and the role of the Ruh al-Quddus in this process. Too philosophical? Too bad. The Ismailis are not always popular among Muslims, but they have a philosophical-theology within Islam that rivals Christianity in the complexity of the issues it deals with — without straying from the bounds of Islam interpreted a little more widely than some should like. Just because we cannot understand something doesn’t mean we must write it–and its adherents–off as unworthy of fair consideration. Hatef Isfahani wrote his great poem Tarj-e Band that includes a beautiful segment on the Muslim who enters a Church and chides a beautiful Christian girl for “dividing” Allah
’s oneness into three; Hatef has the girl reply as a murshid, instructing Hatef that “Were you conscious of Unity’s mystery, you would never call me an infidel; the radiant visage of Eternal Beauty illuminated three distinct mirrors; silk is not threefold in kind if named parniyan, harir, or parand (three Persian words for the same kind of silk).” Hatef leaves hearing the churchbells, still a Muslim, but with a new appreciation of the radical unity of Allah 
, confessing the shahada and wondering at how all peoples really do worship Allah 
.
I don’t think it is sentimental to say that I far prefer this approach, despite the fact some may say it is “nafs focused” to the rather meanspirited approach to the non-Muslim other that seems to underlie some discourses here. Then agian, it is okay, Allah
knows best, and also knows that I have met mmore than my fair share of both Trinitarian and Unitarian Christians convinced that Islam is an abomination or abberation and who find my friendly interest in it to be puzzling at best.
Allah
Ma’akum