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A person’s own decision in matters of marriage, according to Islam

Friday Khutba by Dr Zahid Aziz, for Lahore Ahmadiyya UK, 12 June 2026

“O Prophet, say to your wives: If you desire this world’s life and its adornment, come, I will give you a provision and allow you to depart in a gracious manner. And if you desire Allah and His Messenger and the abode of the Hereafter, then surely Allah has prepared for the doers of good among you a mighty reward.” — ch. 33, Al-Aḥzāb, v. 28–29

یٰۤاَیُّہَا النَّبِیُّ قُلۡ لِّاَزۡوَاجِکَ اِنۡ کُنۡـتُنَّ تُرِدۡنَ الۡحَیٰوۃَ الدُّنۡیَا وَ زِیۡنَتَہَا فَتَعَالَیۡنَ اُمَتِّعۡکُنَّ وَ اُسَرِّحۡکُنَّ سَرَاحًا جَمِیۡلًا ﴿۲۸﴾ وَ اِنۡ کُنۡـتُنَّ تُرِدۡنَ اللّٰہَ وَ رَسُوۡلَہٗ وَ الدَّارَ الۡاٰخِرَۃَ فَاِنَّ اللّٰہَ اَعَدَّ لِلۡمُحۡسِنٰتِ مِنۡکُنَّ اَجۡرًا عَظِیۡمًا ﴿۲۹﴾

These verses were revealed at a very late period when Muslims in Madinah had achieved several victories over their enemies and had started becoming prosperous. Some say that these were revealed even later, when the Holy Prophet Muhammad ruled over the whole of Arabia. Yet despite this change of circumstances for the better, he and his household continued to live sparsely with just the bare essentials required for living. Hazrat Umar related, in connection with the events of the revelation of these verses:

“I went to see the Prophet and saw him lying on a mat without bedding on it, and the mat had left its mark on the body of the Prophet, and he was leaning on a leather pillow stuffed with palm fibres. … I sat down and cast a glance at the room, and by Allah, I could not see anything worthwhile but three hides. I said to him: Call on Allah to make your followers prosperous, for the Persians and the Byzantines have been made prosperous and given worldly luxuries, though they do not worship Allah.”

The Holy Prophet replied:

“Are you in doubt (i.e., that the Hereafter is better than this world)? These people have been given their good things in the life of this world.” (Bukhari, hadith 2468)

A Companion relates:

“There were never three days in a row when the family of Muhammad got to eat fully on all those days, till he died” (Bukhari, hadith 5374).

Hazrat Aishah herself related:

“Till the death of the Prophet we satisfied our hunger with the two black things, i.e. dates and water” (hadith 5383).

The wives of the Holy Prophet began to feel that, with the whole Muslim community becoming prosperous, his household should share in that prosperity as well. This was a natural desire. However, only a few verses earlier, in v. 21 of this chapter, Allah had declared to the Muslims that the Messenger of Allah was the best exemplar for them. This implies that his household also should be an example. In the verses I recited, Allah directed the Holy Prophet to say to his wives that if they desire the good and material things of this life, he would let them have some of them, but let them depart from his household in an amicable and harmonious way. On the other hand, they could instead choose to keep a better connection with Allah and His Messenger and good in the Hereafter, for a greater reward. Thus the Holy Prophet offered each of his wives the choice to leave him or to remain with him. If they chose to leave him, the Holy Prophet would take it in a friendly way, with no hint of any bitterness or rancour. This verse is known as a verse of takhayyar, meaning that the Holy Prophet gave his wives the discretion and choice to decide as they wished.

We can see that the Holy Prophet did not wish to force his wives to live with him in a lifestyle of deprivation if they could not accept or tolerate such a way of living. Having such great consideration for his wives teaches a lesson to all Muslim husbands  to show consideration for the feelings and burdens of their wives. This incident also shows that the Holy Prophet had not married any of his wives without willingness on their part, because he is allowing them to leave him, and to leave with some wealth bestowed upon them. It is commonly said in Muslim societies, especially of the Indian subcontinent, that it is Allah Who determines and ordains whom a person marries. They say it is not actually humans who make that decision. If this was correct, Allah could never have asked the Holy Prophet to allow his wives the choice to leave him.

Hazrat Aishah relates that when these verses were revealed, the Holy Prophet first came to her to put this choice to her. He then did the same with each wife individually. She relates that the Holy Prophet said to her:

“I am going to tell you something, but you need not hurry to give the reply till you consult your parents.”

She continues:

“He knew that my parents would not advise me to separate.”

When the Holy Prophet mentioned this verse to her, she replied:

“Why should I ask my parents for advice in this matter? I desire Allah and His Messenger and the abode of the Hereafter.”

She must have wanted to give this reply based on her own decision without influence from anyone else. If she had consulted her parents, and as expected they (Hazrat Abu Bakr and his wife) had told her to remain with the Holy Prophet, it could be said that this was not her entirely independent decision. Notice also that the Holy Prophet was not pressuring her for an immediate decision, but to reflect on it and consult those who had her best interests at heart.

It is then added in this Hadith report that the Holy Prophet then offered the same choice to his other wives and they gave the same reply as Aishah (Bukhari, hadith 2468). We can see the reason why he asked each wife individually, in privacy. If he had asked them all together as a group, even if any of them had wanted to take worldly wealth and leave him, she would not have been able to say this in the presence of all others. In some versions, Hazrat Aishah asked the Holy Prophet not to mention her decision to any of the other wives. She may have been concerned that this would influence them to give the same reply as her.

In this case, of course, no divorce took place. But I may mention another well-known incident related in the Quran, that of Zaid ibn Haritha and Zainab. Interestingly, this incident is mentioned in the same chapter of the Quran, less than ten verses later. Zaid was a slave purchased by Hazrat Khadijah. When she married the Holy Prophet, she gave him Zaid as a gift. The Holy Prophet liberated Zaid and he became very attached to Zaid. Some years later Zaid’s family discovered that he was living in Makkah. His father and uncle came to fetch him and told the Holy Prophet that they would pay him anything to get him back. The Holy Prophet told them that Zaid should decide whether to go with his family or not, and that if he chose to go with them, the Holy Prophet would not take any payment from them. Zaid was called and he told his father and uncle that he could not leave the Holy Prophet because of love for him. At this, the Holy Prophet declared Zaid as his adopted son.

This was in the pre-prophethood days of the Holy Prophet. Later on, when the Holy Prophet was appointed by Allah as His Messenger, Zaid was one of the first persons to accept Islam. From being a slave, Zaid became known as “son of Muhammad”, and some years later he was married to the Holy Prophet’s cousin Zainab by the Holy Prophet.

The Holy Prophet had been insistent on this marriage in order to set the example that in Islam someone from a slave origin could be married to someone from a leading family like the Quraish, because all are equal in Islam regardless of the society considering one of them as socially low and the other as socially high. Unfortunately, this marriage did not turn out to be happy as neither could adjust to the other because of their very different social standings and behaviour. Zaid complained to the Holy Prophet about Zainab’s attitude, but the Holy Prophet gave him this advice, which is stated in the Quran as follows:

“And when you said to him (Zaid) to whom Allah had shown favour and to whom you had shown a favour: Keep your wife to yourself and keep your duty to Allah” (33:37).

But as the Quran later says in the same verse:

“So when Zaid dissolved her marriage-tie, We gave her to you as a wife…”.

Zaid divorced Zainab against the Holy Prophet’s advice. Allah and the Holy Prophet had shown Zaid many favours in his life. He had been granted freedom from slavery and closeness to the Holy Prophet.  But he is allowed to exercise his choice to end the marriage with Zainab, despite the marriage being at the wish of the Holy Prophet and the Holy Prophet advising its continuity. There is no condemnation of Zaid by Allah or the Holy Prophet for ending his marriage. This shows the highest place given by Islam to an individual’s rights and decisions in personal matters of like and dislike.

As the Quran also adds, the Holy Prophet then married Zainab. Maulana Muhammad Ali writes under his verse:

“After Zainab was divorced, the Holy Prophet took her in marriage, that being the wish of the lady and her relatives before her marriage to Zaid, and the Prophet was, now that the marriage arranged by him proved unsuccessful, morally bound to accept their wishes.”

I may also point out that by marrying Zainab, the Holy Prophet was marrying a divorced woman, who had previously being married to a freed slave, a man of low social standing. Thus he showed by his example that a woman should not be put to disadvantage because of such considerations.

There is another incident of note in this connection. It is reported in Bukhari that Hazrat Aishah purchased the freedom of a slave woman called Bareera (hadith 6751). During slavery she was married to a slave called Mughees who was still a slave. In such cases Islam gives the freed slave woman the choice to remain with her still enslaved husband or to divorce him. She divorced him, but he loved her. It is related by Ibn Abbas that he used to see Mughees following Bareera in the streets, weeping so much that tears would be flowing down his beard, to persuade her to remain with him. The Holy Prophet said:

“Are you not astonished at the love of Mughees for Bareera and the hatred of Bareera for Mughees?”

The Holy Prophet then said to Bareera:

“Why don’t you return to him?”

She said:

“O Messenger of Allah, do you order me to do so?”

He replied:

“No, I am only appealing to you for him.”

She said:

“I am not in need of him.” (Bukhari, Book of Divorce, hadith 5283)

In Bukhari again there is a report from Hazrat Aishah about Bareera, saying that three principles of Sunnah were established from her case, the first being that she was given choice in the matter of her husband when she was freed from slavery (hadith 5097). In another hadith in Bukhari it is stated:

“Bareera was given the choice and she chose to separate from him. She said: If I were given so much wealth, I would still not stay with him.” (Bukhari, hadith 6754)

What Zaid or Bareera did was not considered by anyone as being wrong. Instead, their personal inclinations in marital relationships were respected in Islam and by the Holy Prophet as the determining factor in their lives.

Unfortunately, Muslim societies have neglected to accord these rights to their women and their men, which is a cause of domestic and family problems, as well as bringing Islam into disrepute. May Allah deliver us all from this neglect, ameen.

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