Home » Hanafi Fiqh » Muftionline.co.za » Validating a Nikah: A Friend’s Struggle with Repentance and Marriage

Validating a Nikah: A Friend’s Struggle with Repentance and Marriage

Answered as per Hanafi Fiqh by Muftionline.co.za

Q: This is about a friend. She was in a relationship with a guy and she committed a sin (major). She then got married with one of her cousins who used to lived in Canada, so it was just nikah (no consummation) and she had to wait for her immigration for 2 years. She didn’t repent for what she did because she was living in ignorance of her deen. That guy came back to her life after sometime and she did the sin again. But Allah did mercy on her that she understood the bad intention of him and she broke all the ties with him. She is living with her husband since last 1 year. The issue started when she was reading Quran and she got to know about surah noor. She went to islamqa and there she found that if a person truly repents, then he can marry a chaste person. But if the marriage was before the repentance then the nikah is invalid and they should get a new marriage contract. She can not leave her husband house as it will cause a huge dispute in the family also she does not want to live a haraam life anymore. So she went to a mosque in Canada and ask the imam to take new marriage vows from them and also to become her wali, and Alhamdulillah they did it. But, now she read on islamqa that nikah is invalid if the wali is not present at the time of nikah. She has no relative in Canada who could become her wali. That’s why she had no other option but to ask the imam. Has she done the right thing? Is her nikah with her husband valid now? Is there any hope for her?She does not want to get pregnant before getting sure that she is living a halal life now, she can’t even leave her husband’s house. Please help her. She is very depressed and I am afraid that she will kill herself.

Bismillaah

A: There was no need for the nikaah to be renewed. The first nikah was valid. It is wrong to read the translation of the Qur’aan independently unsupervised. There are approximately four to five explanations to the verse. A simple interpretation is that an adulterer is generally inclined to an adulteress. It does not say that the marriage is impermissible. All it says is that he is inclined to marry, if there is a need to marry, to a person like himself.

And Allah Ta’ala (الله تعالى) knows best.

Answered by:

Mufti Ebrahim Salejee (Isipingo Beach)

This answer was collected from MuftiOnline.co.za, where the questions have been answered by Mufti Zakaria Makada (Hafizahullah), who is currently a senior lecturer in the science of Hadith and Fiqh at Madrasah Ta’leemuddeen, Isipingo Beach, South Africa.