Man marries 33 times to facilitate remarriage of divorced spouses

Tahleel marriage is void, makes those involved adulterers, expert says

An Egyptian man has married 33 women, albeit temporarily, with an intention to divorce and make them permissible for their ex-husbands, local media reported. Mohammad Al Mallah told MBC Misr TV talk show he married 33 times “in order to return the wives to their ex-husbands after they were divorced three times as a charitable act for the sake of God without any compensation.

“The issue started when one of my colleagues at work suggested that I marry her friend who had been divorced three times so that she would return to her husband as a humanitarian act,” Al Mallah said. He added if told his act is illegal, he would stop.

Islam gives three chances to a man in divorcing his wife. After the third divorce, the woman becomes unlawful for him and divorce becomes irrevocable. However, they can become permissible for each other only after the ex-wife has married another man and then divorced/widowed by him.

It is believed that the marriage that will make her permissible for her first husband must be a valid marriage. Temporary marriage (Mut’ah marriage) or marriage for the purpose of making her permissible for first husband (Tahleel marriage) are haram and invalid, says Dr Ahmad Karima, Professor of Comparative Jurisprudence at Al Azhar University.

“A man cannot marry a woman temporarily with an intention to divorce her and make her permissible for her ex-husband. Such marriages don’t make a woman permissible for her ex-husband,” Karima said.

Most Muslim scholars are of the same belief.