Mohebban Fatemeh

This week, our CNN news guest reporter was back. She thought she had found the key to bring down Islam and defeat our Mohebban girls.So, she started off by questioning the justice of Islam and saying that the laws within Islam favors men and oppresses women. She used the law on polygamy (the condition of having more than one wife at once) as an example to support her claim. She also accused the great prophet of Islam as a lustful man who had more than one wife.

It seems this was an issue that even some of our Mohebban girls had problem with it too. However, Sajidah start defending this law by saying that this law came because a lot of men died during battles and the wives and children of those who died needed protection. Sajidah said Allah (S.W.T) restricts this law by telling men they have to maintain justice among their wives or else they are not allowed to marry more than one wife. Meaning that whatever he provides for one wife he has to do the same for the others.

Our CNN news guest reporter immediately said that a man might be able to financially maintain justice, but he will never be able to share devotion and love equally among his wives, so that is still on fair for women.

Most of our Mohebban girls were quiet this time. So we decided to talk about this law in more depth, talking about the history of this law!

The law of polygamy was NOT initiated in Islam, this law existed as a culture from the time of prophet Ibrahim, as it has been mentioned in the bible too. What Islam did was that it gave this law boundary, restricting men to marry not more than 4 wives. As the verse “ … marry another woman for your choice or two, or three, or four…..4:3) was revealed after the battle of Ohud , where the Muslims were defeated and many men died in this battle. Therefore, many orphans and widows were left who needed protection and support, so verse number 3 in chapter 4 was revealed. Since there was no one to protect the orphans and the widows, now Islam allowed men to marry more than one.

We said that Islam is a complete religion and because it has laws for every aspect of life under different scenarios. After World War II many people died and as a result many women were left behind. The German government instituted the law of polygamy to protect and support the widows and orphans of the war.

So, this shows that how complete and thoughtful the religion of Islam is, that a law that was instituted 14 centuries ago in the time of prophet Muhammed (PBH) was even used after the World War II, because the conditions were the same.

So where the intention is to support and protect orphans and widows; men are allowed to marry more than one; but still they need to treat all their wives equally, not giving them hardship of any kind. And as the CNN news reporter said “ Men cannot share devotion” that’s true and the reason is that the law of polygamy is not a law that allows men to marry more than one wife for emotional reasons…but for the mean of protection and support.

In regards of accusing the holy prophet of Islam, we said that Prophet Muhaamed (PBH) married a lady who was 15 years older than him and he stayed with one wife all those years till Hazrate Khadejah passed away. All the marriages after that were because of political and social reasons. So if he was a lustful man then he wouldn’t marry a woman 15 years older than him and also he wouldn’t stay with one in a society where marrying more than one wife was a norm.

We used some examples to clarify and complete our discussion. This debate seemed to be more challenging for our mohebban girls, but Alham…, after we talked about the history of this law it seemed the issue was cleared for some our mohebban girls.

Maybe our CNN news reporter guest was able to ask tricky questions and cause doubt in our mohebban girls…. Still, this doesn’t mean our CNN news reporter won the debate!!!! Because, we did find the answer at the end of our discussion, and our doubts were cleared… remember that doubt is the first step of reaching certainty.