It’s no news that polygyny is divinely accepted and a right to which every Muslim is entitled to. In Islam, a man can marry as much as four women as his wives if he has the capability while a woman also has the right to fit in any position in marriage from first to the fourth.
However, the way some men go about it, is heart – wrenching, head – aching, mind- grieving and soul-ripping. Yes! Men are polygamous in nature and women are monogamously wired too but most of them are willing to swallow the hard pill only because it’s permissible. In all honesty, it isn’t an easy task!
Nonetheless, considering another marriage shouldn’t be a way of incurring the wrath of Allah but a channel to please and satisfy Him. ‘She’s pregnant!’ ‘Accept her and forgive your husband’ ‘the bundle of joy turning to two shouldn’t offend you.’
This isn’t the proper way of pronouncing the birth of another marriage in Islam.
Allah gave the chance then why go about it in a wrong way that is cancerous and pandemical? Having side chicks is not polygyny but rather promiscuity. If a man is capable in all ramifications to marry more, he should, in an halal way and not by rubbing it on his wife’s face that he can do and undo by flaunting and displaying his adulterous style of living to the public’s glare.
Pragmatically, almost every woman prefers a square dry meal per day in a monogamous setting to a four square sumptuous meals a day in a polygamous home. It’s comical and dismaying right? It all boils down to how we are wired. A woman being a ‘Margaret Thatcher’ doesn’t give a man the mark to be promiscuous. Should he be afraid of her or his lord’s punishment? There are also high chances of a promiscuous, contacting dose of sexually transmitted diseases. Isn’t this one of the reasons why polygyny is allowed? Why should the innocents thole because of one ignoramus and such an egocentric adulterer?
And it takes two to tango, behind every cheating husband is a side chick who wouldn’t mind milking her prey to the bone. There’s nothing like halal side chicks. Women going into polygyny should also thread softly. Don’t be the reason your sister in Deen will be wallowing in sorrows. You only call at wee hours to check on him. Fear Allah!
Questions like “How are you doing? Have you eaten? I hope she’s not disturbing you? I hope you are not feeling cold? Don’t worry I’ll soon be there to make you happy!” Is what you spew on phone lustfully to make him mesmerize. SubhanaLlah! Remember no condition is permanent. You know today but knows not tomorrow. That position your are likely to take might change in future. What goes around certainly comes around. You might turn out to be the first tomorrow and the incoming will be spicier than you.
Lastly, It’s high time women stopped going overboard and quit tagging their husbands as their personal entity. The table might turn around in future that is not far. The first can probably finds herself in a setting she fought tooth and nail against before. Forgetting she’d threatened brimstone and fire to exhume and rupture the home she had built for years all because he wanted to fulfill his sunnah and subjected him to parading hotels with different sizes and shapes in skirts. It’s appalling that some women even know their husbands mistresses and the only song they reiterate and echo into their brain is not to allow the illicit cankerworm, affairs lead to pregnancy. What a profane!
In conclusion, It’s high time we changed the narratives and stop associating Polygyny with Promiscuity. If you are craving for it and you’re capable physically, emotionally and financially go into it and enjoy swimming in halal pools. Be just in your dealings and not lean on one than the other except you want to be raised with half your body paralyzed on the day of reckoning.
Allow him if he wants it. Remember his qadar had been written even before he was born. Accept her with a good mindset, cruise your polygynous marriage and rock it in styles. Transit at your own pace and don’t rush things. It’s normal to feel jealous . Our mothers (wives of the prophet) did too but envy is frowned upon, for it’s disastrous and dreadful.
As you are going in, fear Allah and extend hands of friendship. You married your husband and not someone else’s. You aren’t a correction pen either and go about it in an halal way. Kindly bear it at the rear of your mind that he might take another tomorrow. Accept her friendship and if she neither extended hers nor accepted yours, maintain your lane. She’ll later come around if she realizes your intentions are pure and leave naysayers out of your lives.
Written by Maryam Olafiku Umm Muslimah
English 