Talk:Polygamy in Islam
That is a key finding of a new University of British Columbia-led study that explores the global rise of monogamous marriage as a dominant cultural institution. The study suggests that institutionalized monogamous marriage is rapidly replacing polygamy because it has lower levels of inherent social problems.
"Our goal was to understand why monogamous marriage has become standard in most developed nations in recent centuries, when most recorded cultures have practiced polygyny," says UBC Prof. Joseph Henrich, a cultural anthropologist, referring to the form of polygamy that permits multiple wives, which continues to be practiced in some parts of Africa, Asia, the Middle East and North America.
"The emergence of monogamous marriage is also puzzling for some as the very people who most benefit from polygyny -- wealthy, powerful men -- were best positioned to reject it," says Henrich, lead author of the study that was recently published in the journal Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society. "Our findings suggest that that institutionalized monogamous marriage provides greater net benefits for society at large by reducing social problems that are inherent in polygynous societies."
Considered the most comprehensive study of polygamy and the institution of marriage, the study finds significantly higher levels rape, kidnapping, murder, assault, robbery and fraud in polygynous cultures. According to Henrich and his research team, which included Profs. Robert Boyd (UCLA) and Peter Richerson (UC Davis), these crimes are caused primarily by pools of unmarried men, which result when other men take multiple wives.
"The scarcity of marriageable women in polygamous cultures increases competition among men for the remaining unmarried women," says Henrich, adding that polygamy was outlawed in 1963 in Nepal, 1955 in India (partially), 1953 in China and 1880 in Japan. The greater competition increases the likelihood men in polygamous communities will resort to criminal behavior to gain resources and women, he says.
According to Henrich, monogamy's main cultural evolutionary advantage over polygyny is the more egalitarian distribution of women, which reduces male competition and social problems. By shifting male efforts from seeking wives to paternal investment, institutionalized monogamy increases long-term planning, economic productivity, savings and child investment, the study finds. Monogamy's institutionalization has been assisted by its incorporation by religions, such as Christianity.
Monogamous marriage also results in significant improvements in child welfare, including lower rates of child neglect, abuse, accidental death, homicide and intra-household conflict, the study finds. These benefits result from greater levels of parental investment, smaller households and increased direct "blood relatedness" in monogamous family households, says Henrich, who served as an expert witness for British Columbia's Supreme Court case involving the polygamous community of Bountiful, B.C.
Monogamous marriage has largely preceded democracy and voting rights for women in the nations where it has been institutionalized, says Henrich, the Canadian Research Chair in Culture, Cognition and Evolution in UBC's Depts. of Psychology and Economics. By decreasing competition for younger and younger brides, monogamous marriage increases the age of first marriage for females, decreases the spousal age gap and elevates female influence in household decisions which decreases total fertility and increases gender equality.University of British Columbia, ScienceDaily, January 24, 2012
More men than women in Muslim countries: List of countries by sex ratio (Permanent link)
Muhammad committed polygamy out of political necessity
According to the Muslim apologists, "Muhammad married most of his wives for political reasons. He only married so many women at one time out of political necessity."
First of all, this reasoning does not convince a Jew, a Christian or a Western feminist. No matter how urgent the needs of state, they argue, nothing justifies having more than one wife at a time. If Muhammad could not see any way around his political problems except polygamy, that simply proves he was not a prophet.
Secondly, we might take the line that polygamy was normal in seventh-century Arabia, and Muhammad was not doing anything wrong by the standards of his own culture. That will not convince a Jew or a Christian that he was a true prophet, but it might convince a modern Westerner that he was a decent person by the standards of his day. In that case, however, we still have to ask why Muhammad limited other Muslims to four wives each, yet at one point in his own life, he had eleven wives plus the intention of adding more. When Ghaylan ibn Salama became a Muslim, he had to divorce six of his ten wives – even though this was in early 630, when Muhammad himself had exactly ten wives! Why did Muhammad pick the apparently random number of four and enforce this as the maximum number of wives, yet break this rule himself? If the answer is that it was politically necessary, we would expect some exceptional political situation that, in order to ensure the future survival of Islam, required Muhammad to marry all those women.
Many articles have been written by Muslim apologists to explain what these exceptional political circumstances were. Here are a few.
http://www.al-islam.org/lifeprophet/25.htm
http://www.ispi-usa.org/muhammad/appendix2.html
http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/opinion/orl-edpahmed04120402dec04,0,6846801.story
Such writers do describe the political advantages of Muhammad’s marriages (at some sacrifice of factual accuracy) but they never attempt to explain why the political crisis was so urgent and compelling that Muhammad was required to break his own rules. They never face the question: “If Muhammad had not married this woman, what would have been the probable consequences for Islam?”
Let us try a thought-experiment. Imagine that Muhammad’s first wife, Khadija bint Khuwaylid, had lived another 15 years. Imagine that she, and not Ayesha or any other woman, had smoothed his pillow as he lay dying. Imagine that Khadija had remained his only wife ever. Would this have been a great disaster for Islam? What would have been the consequences for the great political crises of Muhammad’s life? Let us briefly list the major political disasters that Muhammad faced, together with a few words on how he handled them.
- 1. 616-619. The Quraysh enforced a trade blockade against the Hashim clan in Mecca. The Muslims survived by living of Khadija’s wealth. Although the Muslim historians do not state this directly, the blockade was probably lifted due to the Satanic Verses compromise.
- 2. 622. The Quraysh pronounced the death sentence on Muhammad. He survived by escaping to Medina and moving his community there. If Khadija had been alive, I suppose she and not Sawda would have accompanied Fatima in the rearguard party.
- 3. 624-627. The Jews in Medina announced that they did not believe Muhammad was the Messiah, which seriously dented his credibility with the local pagans. He ejected two of the tribes and killed the third. He was now “Duke” of Medina. If Khadija had been alive, I imagine the Angel Gabriel would have brought all those urgent messages about the treachery of the Jews in her house instead of in Hind’s.
- 4. 627. The Meccans, together with a few Bedouin chiefs and exiled Jews, besieged Medina, hoping to kill Muhammad in the battle. Muhammad dug a trench around Medina and so the siege failed. Muhammad then conquered a Kilab tribe and secured from them a trade blockade against Mecca. Over the next three years, Mecca was starved out. If Khadija had been alive, I expect Muhammad would have conquered the Kilabites and blockaded Mecca in exactly the same way.
- 5. 628. Meanwhile, Muhammad took a pre-emptive strike against the surviving Jews. After a war of conquest against Khaybar, every Jew in Arabia was reduced to vassalage. There was a danger that their Ghatafan allies would retaliate, so Muhammad stock-piled weapons in anticipation. If Khadija had been alive, I expect she would have been the one who carried the first aid box to Khaybar.
- 6. 630. After Mecca was starved out, Muhammad mustered an army of ten thousand and marched in to conquer the city. The “Duke” of Mecca was converted at swordpoint, and the city surrendered. This served as an Awful Warning to the Ghatafans, and even the Yemenites negotiated an “alliance” (surrender) rather than face the Muslim armies. If Khadija had been alive … it’s really difficult to imagine how anything at all would have been different.
- 7. 630–632. Muhammad conquered whatever was left of Arabia. By the time of his death, he was effectively “King”. If Khadija had been alive, she would have been “Queen”.
Have you noticed how NONE of these political crises was solved by a marriage alliance? If Khadija had survived, it would have made little difference to the fortunes of Islam. Muhammad would have conquered the peninsula and imposed his religion upon it just the same.
So let’s try a different thought-experiment. What would Islam have lost if Muhammad had failed to marry any of the other women?
- 1. If he hadn’t married Ayesha, Sawda or Hafsa, he might have had to think of a different way of raising money. However, what with begging, plundering and taxing, Muhammad seemed to have had that problem worked out.
- 2. If he hadn’t married Zaynab bint Jahsh, he would have saved himself quite a bit of trouble, as this marriage – the first to break his “four wives only” rule – caused him social embarrassment on several fronts.
- 3. If he hadn’t married Mulayka, Fatima, Asma or Amra, he wouldn’t have had to divorce them, which might have kept his relations with their families smoother. But never mind about this – only Asma was of any political importance, and the divorce proved that even she was not as important as her family had hoped.
- 4. If he hadn’t married Zaynab bint Khuzayma, Hind or Maymuna, nothing at all would have changed.
- 5. If he hadn’t taken four slave-concubines who were of no political importance of all, it’s just possible that he could have avoided the accusation of being a womaniser.
Only three of Muhammad’s marriages can seriously be considered “political” in any sense. These three marriages were all contracted in 628. But how crucial were the political issues in that year?
- 6. Juwayriya was the daughter of a petty chief whose tribe was flattened in a single raid. This tribe was not going to be any more trouble to Muhammad regardless of whether he married the chief’s daughter. Muhammad conquered plenty of more important tribes over the years, but he did not need to marry the chiefs’ daughters in order to maintain their submission.
- 7. Ramla was the daughter of Abu Sufyan, the “Duke” of Mecca. She had defected to Islam several years earlier and had barely spoken to her father since. It did not seem to bother her that the Muslims had killed her brother at the Battle of Badr or that Muhammad had sent assassins after her father (these assassins failed their assignment, but everyone knew that Muhammad had tried it). So marrying Ramla did not create any kind of “alliance” with Abu Sufyan. Rather, it enabled Muhammad to deliver a psychological snub to his enemy, along the lines of: “Sucks to you! Look who’s sleeping in my bed!” Even when Abu Sufyan tried to negotiate through his daughter for peace with Muhammad, she refused to cooperate. This marriage might have been a psychological blow to the unlucky father, but it is unlikely that he was so discouraged that it directly contributed to his eventual defeat.
- 8. Safiya was the First Lady of Khaybar; she was related to everyone of importance in the Jewish community. Muhammad married her after he had humiliated Khaybar. This “alliance” brought no advantages to the Jews. The dying Muhammad actually stated in Safiya’s presence that he wanted all the remaining Jews ejected from Arabia! It is highly doubtful that the marriage discouraged the Jews from further rebellion against Muhammad. The reason they gave him no more trouble was that they were not powerful enough to do so. If they had been strong enough to defy Muhammad, they would probably not have been deterred by the fact that Safiya was a “hostage” in Medina; in true Jewish spirit, Safiya herself would have expected her people to sacrifice her for the greater good.
If Muhammad had not married these three women, it is practically certain that their respective tribes would not have altered their behaviour in any way. He did not need these marriages for political reasons. The brides were simply trophies.
So what did motivate Muhammad to marry all those women at once? If it was not politics, perhaps we could form a hypothesis along a more personal line...1234567 (talk) 22:54, 30 July 2012 (PDT)
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Another Muslim Perspective Scrutinized
Argumentum Ad hominem "tu quoque" logical fallacy
Yes, 12 weeks out of the year is such a looooooong time. Especially when those weeks are spread out over the entire course of a year. How can men handle the wait? Also, it is a known biological fact that women who live together will have synchronous menstrual cycles - meaning that the man will still have that week every month where he can't have sex, because all of his wives will be menstruating.
And that means old men should continue having children although they might die the next day of old age and be unable to support their families any longer?
And for all the woman's hard work and suffering, her husband should be allowed to sleep with other women because he can't handle the post-natal six-week wait.
So, populating the earth with as many children as possible is more important than the happiness of the wife and the health of the marriage.
This statement is illogical and also scientifically inaccurate.
Not anymore thanks to DNA testing! Paternal testing in the United States costs a few hundred dollars. This is also only relevant if you are obsessed with paternity.
In other words, since the Quran commands that women be dependent on men, then men should be allowed to have multiple sex partners because they are obligated to maintain women.
Two paychecks is a disadvantage? Two men to mow the lawn is a disadvantage?
Since adoption is clearly not an option, and a woman's breeding abilities are more important than anything else.
Allah is responsible for the nature of man...and he made men incapable of monogamy? This argument clearly insults men.
Well guess what? A Muslim man does not need the agreement of his first wife to take a second wife.
This statement is so completely illogical and ridiculous that we're simply going to move on to the next one...
They forgot this quote: [Quran 4:129] Ye will not be able to deal equally between (your) wives, however much ye wish (to do so). But turn not altogether away (from one), leaving her as in suspense. If ye do good and keep from evil, lo! Allah is ever Forgiving, Merciful. Allah said that men will not be able to deal equally with multiple wives...but he still didn't ban polygamy.
In other words, if you can't understand it...shut your brain off. This Muslim's argument is more offensive to men than it is to women.