Can a Wife Divorce Her Husband and How Can a Marriage Be Saved under These Circumstances?
Hanafi Fiqh
Answered by Mawlana Ilyas Patel
Question
The wife filed for divorce in a New York court (with her parents’ permission) without informing her husband. Is this divorce valid, according to the Hanafi school?
Can a wife divorce her husband, according to others (such as Shafi’i school and Salafis)?
How can the marriage be saved under these circumstances (the wife filed for divorce with her parents’ permission)?
Answer
In the Name of Allah, the Most Merciful and Compassionate
I pray you are well.
A wife cannot divorce her husband by appointing a civil court judge to act on her behalf and dissolve the marriage, as he is not a Muslim judge. Neither a marriage dissolution nor a valid divorce will take place. The wife will remain a wife and is not free to marry anyone until the husband divorces her.
Importance of Taking Quranic Steps in Marital Disputes: Counselling, Disciplinary Action, and Arbitration
The Quran has given us a solution by using arbitration:
“If you fear a split between them (the spouses), send one arbitrator from his people and one from her people. If they desire to set things right, Allah shall bring about harmony between them. Surely, Allah is All-Knowing, All-Aware.” [Quran, 4:35]
The first approach in a marital dispute is to sit down and advise the other about responsibilities and commitments, then form a form of disciplinary action, then arbitration according to the Quran and how it is understood in all four schools. Then, if all this doesn’t work, the husband can give a single divorce. This is the letter and spirit of the law. [Ibn ’Abidin, Radd al-Muhtar]
In your case, you should both try to consult a reliable local scholar, a marriage counselor that both of you agree and can sit with, and family arbitration.
Read and share the links below and try to find common ground and reconcile.
A Guide to Marriage: SeekersGuidance Reader
I pray and hope sincerely that you both agree to take the correct steps and find a way to resolve the issues.
Wassalam,
[Mawlana] Ilyas Patel
Checked and Approved by Shaykh Faraz Rabbani
Mawlana Ilyas Patel is a traditionally-trained scholar who has studied in the UK, India, Pakistan, Syria, Jordan, and Turkey. He started his early education in the UK. He went on to complete the hifz of the Quran in India, then enrolled in an Islamic seminary in the UK, where he studied the secular and ‘Aalimiyya sciences. He then traveled to Karachi, Pakistan. He has been an Imam in Rep of Ireland for several years. He has taught hifz of the Quran, Tajwid, Fiqh, and many other Islamic sciences to children and adults onsite and online extensively in the UK and Ireland. He taught at a local Islamic seminary for 12 years in the UK, where he was a librarian and a teacher of Islamic sciences. He currently resides in the UK with his wife. His interest is a love of books and gardening.
