nikah marriage and divorce

"Sign a form in a government office and boom, you married. Then have whatever ceremony you want."

As a non-Anglican Protestant, this is the option most people who are married in my church went for. (A few married in the Anglican church or in other churches which were licensed.)

The difference between my church's wedding ceremony and a nikah is that the minister wouldn't marry you if you didn't also have the civil paperwork in place. Legally I assume he could, but he wouldn't, both because there's pretty clear instructions in the Bible about doing things where possible according to the law of the land, and to protect the lower earner/ more vulnerable partner and any children in the event of a divorce.

(For completeness, I have heard of crazy American Christians proposing marriage without state involvement but never of anyone in the UK proposing such a thing - and I think it's pretty niche in America. Incidentally the crazy Americans propose it precisely because it means a wife doesn't get anything if you divorce. I say proposing rather than having because I've never seen any evidence that these people have found a woman who can tolerate them, so afaik they're at least mostly single.)

If you want a nikah recognised in UK law, but don't want a legal marriage for some reason, do it abroad, where it will count as one of the millions of marriage types UK recognises as foreign-and-valid but can't offer themselves.

Dowries, whichever side gets the money, are illegal, in the UK, as is polygamy.

Along with most other countries in the world, the nikah could thus never be legal here. I'm with the court on this one. DC aren't really affected as long as the father's name is put on the birth certificate, although in the event of a split it's much easier for the father to abandon them.

I thought this was common knowledge. It has bween on the news in the past to raise awareness of the issue. and at least 2 examples given shows that the couples were aware.

I think this is really more complicated than it seems. My dds school friend (late 20's) agreed to an Islamic marriage with her partner to keep her parents happy. She doesn't want to be legally married to him. She was happy with living together, her family were not. Turning her Islamic marriage into a legally recognised marriage would not be a good thing for her.

Yes I think she should dump him.... but they do have a child and it's taking her a while to get there. She's the high earner AND primary carer

I think it’s reasonable that women know what a marriage is in legal terms before entering into it. Marriage isn’t compulsory; nobody needs it. It’s a basic point that can be covered in school. It is not complex to understand either.

There are lots of cultural issues with nikah that means it is very unlikely ever to be recognised as equivalent to a formal civil marriage in England. The state is right to keep the legal status of marriage as it is. It is not exactly demanding on people. It’s done as it is to prevent exploitation of people and forcing women into legally binding scenarios without consent.

The other situation where you don’t check what your marriage means or is? I think that is where you bear some responsibility yourself. Common law or nikah, these are not marriages and rightly so. You would be developing parallel systems of law for certain groups and that is not a good thing for women.

There's 0 need to ban any religious ceremonies - the issue's faking marriage, not a religious issue. As Britain's mosques have realised before the rest of us.

My mate got 'married' 3x - once in a registry office, once with a nikah and finally a blessing in church. Same man every time, I hasten to add. They both came from religious families and wanted everyone happy.

It's identical to the common-law wife scenario, also used throughout the ages to con women into providing domestic services without payment, but better at deceiving women because there is a ceremony.

And today's relationship of choice, cohabitation - posters ask daily 'What Will I Get for Splitting' when they'll get 0 except bills and the children to bring up, house and feed.

I agree with the couple signing statements with content as @NonnyMouse1337 suggests. If only someone could make cohabitees sign one too.

I think that's a good idea. Actually banning religious only ceremonies would raise difficulties with freedom of religion, so an acceptable compromise would be having to tag a bit on.

It should be a legal requirement that any ceremony describing itself as a marriage, nikah, wedding, civil partnership etc. but which will not result in a legal marriage / civil partnership must include a statement that "This ceremony does not mean you are married under the law. In law, you are two single people. If the relationship ends, you will have no rights in law to financial assistance from each other, and you will not be able to divorce in the courts. If your partner dies, you will have no automatic right to inherit" etc.etc.

I agree with this approach. It should be made very clear by whoever is conducting the ceremony.

There should also be an awareness campaign of posters and adverts that inform women from minority backgrounds or those who believe in the 'common law marriage' myth that they are very vulnerable if they don't pursue a legal marriage, and they need to be wary of any man who refuses to have one.

Thanks for this OP and to all contributions so far. This topic is of personal and professional interest. Personally it’s not of concern but with some of the people I’m in contact with professionally it could well be.

I hadn’t considered the vulnerability of a nikah - actually it could be more of a problem than the ‘common law’ relationship assumptions because in some families the nikah is what is seen to legitimise the union (cultural/ religious conformity) so there is little onus to go down the legal route. This means that the man can appear honourable -and won’t experience social pressure- but the woman still has no rights as a wife. That’s very interesting and encouraging that some mosques are putting measures in place to address this.

Hopefully this will highlight the issue but probably education in schools, via TV, through mosques would have the most impact. It should be part of the ceremony, as it is in the Catholic church.

It should be a legal requirement that any ceremony describing itself as a marriage, nikah, wedding, civil partnership etc. but which will not result in a legal marriage / civil partnership must include a statement that "This ceremony does not mean you are married under the law. In law, you are two single people. If the relationship ends, you will have no rights in law to financial assistance from each other, and you will not be able to divorce in the courts. If your partner dies, you will have no automatic right to inherit" etc.etc.

Anyone "married" in a pseudo-wedding without this sort of statement should be able to sue the celebrant for the alimony / inheritance they would otherwise have received.

The couple had an Islamic wedding ceremony in a west London restaurant in 1998 in the presence of an imam and about 150 guests, but no civil ceremony subsequently took place, despite Mrs Akhter repeatedly raising the issue.

In many ways it’s analogous to a white British couple having an engagement party with friends and family in 1998 and buying a house, but never getting formally married, despite the female partner repeatedly raising the subject.

Some people will believe that Nikah or cohabitation confer rights under U.K. law, some will know they don’t but be trying to win round a reluctant or vague potential groom (“repeatedly raising the issue”). Some will be deafened by their biological clock. Some will believe assurances of “later/when we have more money/once we’ve bought a house/whatever”.

If the answer is legislation, one set of legislation could solve both problems.

In many ways it is no different from cohabiting couples and ‘common law wives’. There are hundreds of thousands of non-Muslim women in the uk who live under the delusion that they have rights similar to married women to family property, next of kin etc. A friend on Facebook shared her daughters upcoming ‘marriage’ except they aren’t getting married; they are having a party and she is changing her name. I suspect she has no idea that she is leaving herself open especially if she gives up work to bring up kids.

Agree Superloud, in England the nikah contract is not worth the paper it’s written on. So unless the mahr is paid up front, there’s no way the terms of the nikah will be honoured if the bloke turns out to be a dick.

And if he’s a good man the family will ensure the nikah is completed legally anyway. There’s the Islamic requirement of adhering to the law of the land. Which a lot of men who are not intending to treat their wives honourably tend to gloss over.

Actually been reminded. A friends wedding venue was changed by her fiancé at a very last minute point.

The new venue wasn’t licensed so their nikah wasn’t legally binding. And once the Nikah had been completed he was reluctant to have a civil marriage.

He turned out to be all sorts of abusive as well, I think personally she had a lucky escape as she fled the marriage and didn’t have to go to court however the man and his family kept her jewellery and refused to return it denying all knowledge of it. Essentially it’s her word against his family’s.

A few years down the line and a woman contacted friend to ask why they’d got divorced as she’d been approached with a proposal by this mans family!

Plus even if those terms were agreed in the Nikah that you suggest, they have no weight in the civil court so cannot be enforced in terms of the law.

It's a variation of 'common-law marriage,' a zombie factoid that will not lie down.

Superloud I understand what you mean, but the question is also how do we know there are fewer people (proportionately speaking as the population is smaller) with a Nikah and no civil marriage in Scotland, because the point is precisely that the Nikah is not registered. So there are no official statistics.

I like the way it is in Scotland where it's the person who's licensed to perform a marriage ceremony.
There's lots less people up here with no civil marriage.
Also you can eg get married in a random castle or on a hill.

Another thing women don't know a lot about or don't feel confident to advocate for is terms within the nikah that give them protection.
It is quite flexible and can be tailored to the couple.
You can say that if you separate you want to be given financial provision for 6 months rent and 800 quid a month for expenses.
Or whatever you both agree on.

Women generally do seem to know about this in principle but worry the imam wouldn't agree or that their fiance wouldn't .

We need to copy the French. You get legally married by filling in a form at the Registry Office, with no music and no ceremony. Then you can go off and arrange whatever you like, which has no legal status whatsoever.

SD1978 the fact that she repeatedly asked for the Nikah to be made legally binding and this did not happen shows that Muslim women are still at risk of inequality - her wishes were essentially ignored which leaves her financially vulnerable now because she does not have the protection of civil law marriage. So she had a Nikah assuming the civil ceremony would follow (and many women trust their husbands when they get married, add in community norms and pressures) and only once she had the Nikah did it become apparent this was not going to happen. To me this ignoring of her request and the legal need for civil marriage to protect her rights is part and parcel of financial abuse and coercive control - it is certainly not treating her as an equal and ensures she does not get the same settlement she would be entitled to in a civil divorce. That is financial abuse.

In other words, in this specific case, the woman has been and is being financially abused (and the point that her wishes were not respected early on shows this). So the specific case proves your general point.

It's even more complicated, if you have a Nikah in some other countries then it is a legal marriage in the UK.

A group of students were discussing this after a TV programme, one had got married in Pakistan and when the couple got back to the UK tried get paperwork and were told it is legally binding because it is in Pakistan.

The problem with paperwork is that a man can have more than one wife in a muslim wedding, you can't do that legally in the UK.

Abusive men will exploit the Nikah, the programme linked to above, a women had a Nikah and only when the relationship broke down did she find out that a) she wasn't married and b)her husband was legally married to another woman.

I know people who consider the religious bit to be the proper marriage, not just muslims. I worked with a woman who was only going to have the religious marriage but then she and husband to be found out they could get some tax back if they legally married. This was obviously a few years ago.

Maybe that would help? Not the old 'married man's allowance' but something for the couple just in the first year of the marriage. It would not need to be much.

With this case specifically- she knew it wasn't legally binding, and repeatedly asked for documentation to make it legally binding, so no- I don't think it should have been treated the same as a recognised legal marriage. However- the issue this also brings up is that if the Muslim marriage ceremony is held first, the man has no obligation to sign the paperwork, is already married in the eyes of the people who's opinions matter to him, and can practise financial abuse and coercion for good as the wife has no legal grounding to having a fair share of assets as not married. It's a really tough one: