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Shiavault - a Vault of Shia Islamic Books Truth About Shia Ithna Ashari Faith Mut’a: Temporary Marriage It is a woman marrying a man according to an agreed upon dower and for a pre-determined period of time stated in a marriage contract which incorporates all the conditions of a marriage regarded by the Sharī’ah as sound.

Its format is that a woman says the following to the man after they both agree and accept the dower and the period of time: “I married you to myself on such-and-such a dower and for the known period of time” where this period is named exactly. The man’s answer will be: “I accepted”. Representation in this contract is accepted just as it is in any other contract.

According to the terms of the contract, the woman becomes the wife of the man, and the man becomes her husband till the end of the period specified in the contract. They may renew it to a different period of time or even forever if they wish. The wife has to observe the ‘idda (waiting period) after the period terminates. The duration of the ‘idda will be two months if she still goes through the menstrual cycle; otherwise, it is forty-five days.

The child, male or female, born out of a mut’a marriage belongs to his/her father.[^1] This type of marriage is used to scandalize the Shī’ah because the latter believe in its legality, but the questions here are:  Where did the Shī’ahs come up with this sort of marriage?  Is this sort of legality subject to what a mujtahid deems as permissible or prohibitive?  And what are the proofs for its legality from the Glorious Book and the Purified Sunnah?

In order to answer all these questions, we say that all Muslims, in their various sects, are unanimous in their view that this sort of marriage was legislated in the dawn of Islam.

Al-Bukhāri, quoting [Abdullāh] Ibn Abbās, cites the latter saying, “We used to participate in military campaigns with the Prophet (ṣ), and we did not have our women with us, so we said to him, ‘Could we have eunuchs [for sex]?’ But he prohibited us from doing that and later permitted any of us to marry a woman by giving her as simple [a dower] as a garment. Then he recited the following verse: ‘ O you who believe!

Do not make unlawful the good things which Allāh has made lawful for you...’ (Qur’ān, 5:90).” [^2] The verse saying “... seeing that you derive benefit [mut’a, enjoyment] from them, give them their prescribed dowers” (Qur’ān, 4:24) had already been revealed about this type of marriage.