Islamic marriage advice and family advice

Half a Virgin

Salaam everyone. I am 22 years old, and perceive myself to be a modest muslim girl who has grown up in London my whole life. I am writing this post in the hope that someone can shed some light into my dark.

flower with petals fallingThe story goes, when i was in my first year at university, three years ago, the mixed environment was new to me as i went to an all girls secondary school and 6th form. Not long into the semester, I was receiving attention from many boys, one in particular who had asked me out on a date. He wouldnt take no for an answer, so i went out with him and within a week we were labelled as a couple (its even worse, because this took place in the holy month of Ramadan, astaghfirullah).

He was my first boyfriend, and at this stage I was very naive, foolish, unknowledgable about the whole dating process, and was somewhat heavily influenced by his lifestyle. Although he was my 1st boyfriend, I was his 9th girlfriend.

Due to my naivety, I am scarred by certain things he made me do, which i realised later are considered to be major sins in Islam. After research, I can say with deep repentance that I am half a virgin due to certain things i received rather than gave through him. Because he lived in halls residence near the university, he would regularly invite me over and invite me to all the haraam things which i cannot believe i engaged in. More to the point, i have a very good muslim friend (potential life partner), who i am considering introducing to my parents. However, he does not know yet that i am half a virgin.

In one of the articles, I read sister Noorah's advice advising a young girl in a similar situation not to say anything because 'Allah has covered up your situation and it may be better for you not to uncover it..What happened is in the past, and you have repented from that.' However, i would like to know the validity of this statement by sister Noorah, or anyone else who can help me with this.

Ive always been an honest person, alhamdulillah, thus I intend on telling him the whole truth so he does not marry a girl who is not worthy of his purity. If he rejects me, I will accept as Allahs will. However, I have repented for this day and night, and still cant consume the reality of it. I am in such a lost state of mind, and cannot understand whether I should tell him the truth, or conceal it in the hope that both he and Allah forgive me one day.

I would appreciate it wholeheartedly if somebody can enlighten me on this topic, with islamic referencing/hadiths, and anything which can ease my pain.

Jazakallahu Khayr.
Anonymous.


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10 Responses »

  1. Dear Sister, Walaykumsalaam,

    I am sorry for the turmoil you are experiencing. Unfortunately committing sins have consequences and what you are feeling are the consequences. At the same time, we must always remind ourselves that life is a test and we are not immune to sinning. If we realise that we have sinned, this is a blessing from Allah and we should stop the sin and repent straight away. At the same time, we must not reveal our sins to anyone. Allah through His(swt) Mercy protects us and thereby conceals our sins, so it is ungrateful if we overlook this. InshaAllah the following hadiths will give you the proof you requested:

    The Messenger of Allah (صلي الله عليه وسلم) said: “My entire nation is safe, except al-Mujahirin (those who boast of their sins). Among the Mujaharah is that a man commits an (evil) act, and wakes up in the morning while Allah has kept his (sin) a secret, he says: “O so-and-so! Last night I did this and that.” He goes to sleep while Allah has kept his (sin) a secret but he wakes up in the morning and uncovers what Allah has kept a secret!” [Saheeh al-Bukhari]

    Abdullah Ibn Masoud (رضي الله عنه) related, ‘A man came to the Prophet and said: ‘O Messenger of Allah! I have mingled with a woman in the far side of al-Medina, and I fulfilled my desire short of actually having sexual intercourse with her. So, here am I, judge me according to what you decide.’ Umar Ibn al-Khattab (رضي الله عنه) then said: ‘Allah had kept your secret, why did not you keep your secret?’ [Sharh Muslim]

    Similarly, if one becomes aware of somebody else’s sin, he should keep it a secret. Allah’s Messenger (صلي الله عليه وسلم) said: “He, who relieves a hardship of this Dunya (world) for a believer, Allah will relieve (from him) a hardship of the Day of Resurrection; he who makes easy an indebted person, Allah will make it easy for him in the Dunya and the Hereafter; he who covers a Muslim (meaning his mistakes and shortcomings), Allah will cover him in the Dunya and the Hereafter …” [Muslim]

    ***
    I can understand why you want to be open with your future spouse, you want to shed the burden of keeping this secret and hope that this man will accept you as you are. You would want to know that your future husband would not judge you if he ever came to know of your past. This would be ideal, but in revealing your sins, you would be going against Allah's commands.

    Instead, I would advise you to keep your sins between yourself and Allah. Although this may feel burdensome at times, accept it as one of the consequences of your past actions. Furthermore, keep doing tawbah, have hope that Allah(swt) will forgive you and this will give you the peace you are looking for and then you will not need to confide in anyone else.

    Dear Sister, let go of what happened, do tawbah and remember that you have a right to privacy, you have a right to protect your dignity and conceal your mistakes. By remaining silent, you are not betraying or misleading your future partner, you are just trying to honour Allah's Laws. If from what you know of this man, he appears to be judgemental, then I would think twice about marrying a man like that anyway. On the other hand, if this man is decent, humble and truly God fearing, he will understand that if you have had a past, it is just that - 'your past'. He will not bother you about it, or pry, he will know that you are the person you are today because of whatever you have been through and will love you all the same.

    Allah, glorified be He, tells us: "Tell them (O Muhammad ): 'O My slaves who have wronged their souls, do not despair of Allah's mercy, for Allah will forgive all the sins. He is indeed very Forgiving, very Compassionate, Turn to Him then, and obey Him (in all your affairs).'" (Al-Zumar:53,54).

    As for your worry about you not be good enough to marry this man because you feel he is pure and you are not, the following hadith of the Prophet (saw) should be enough for you: "He who repented is like him who has no sin on him."

    Keep striving Sister,

    SisterZ
    IslamicAnswers.com Editor

  2. See also this post from last year:

    Boasting about sins

    I realize that you are not boasting about your sins - quite the opposite - but the post discusses in general the issue of concealing one's past sins and not talking about them.

    Wael
    IslamicAnswers.,com Editor

  3. Is it proper to ask a potential of his past? I personally like to know what and how much he has done. I won't be too judgmental but I will look at the person he is right now. And at the time if he refuses to answer them then I don't know if I can move on.

    • Sarah, depends on what you mean by his "past". It's fine to ask questions like:

      * Have you been previously married?
      * Have you ever been convicted of a crime?
      * Have you ever had a sexually transmitted disease?

      Those are reasonable questions that any potential partner has a right to ask.

      But if you are asking people to reveal sins that they committed in the past, then no it's not right or appropriate. Whatever they have done in the past is between them and Allah. So it's not appropriate to ask questions like:

      * Have you ever tried alcohol or drugs?
      * Have you ever had an improper relationship?
      * Have you ever committed zinaa?
      * Etcetera.

      I would never ask those questions because if the person is pure then it's insulting, and if they committed sins in the past then made tawbah then it's behind them and none of my business. If someone asked me such questions I would say, "Whatever I have done in the past is between me and Allah. This is who I am now." If that causes the person to walk away, then so be it.

      Wael
      IslamicAnswers.com Editor

  4. Assalamu Aleikum Sister,

    It is right that Allah subhanahu va taa'la covers and conceals all sins that we have once committed in our

    past. But I doubt that this applies to a marriage proposal or the usual enquiry about the person you

    want to marry. I think it applies to the community life of Muslims and your connection with your lord.

    Of course Allah ta'ala covers mistakes, but this is a life-long decision and before getting married,

    people are allowed to enquire about the person as much as possible. Virginity shouldn't be a big

    deal from an Islamic perspective, but in many cultures, this issue leads to honour killings, domestic

    violence and misogenist attitudes. That doesn't mean you have to tell him everything about your past-

    but trust and understanding are also part of the relationship. If I would like to marry a guy, and knew

    he had girlfriends before, I would ask him about it, because Islam is not the religion of hypocracy.

    Where do we draw the line? Hypocracy is the next step- that we enjoy ourselves before marriage and

    then say- ok... we committed zina, drank alcohol and did this or that... but it's not going to happen again.

    This doesn't apply to your case..... but by being honest, a lot of trust is built. Just imagine he meets

    the guy you had an affair with on a meeting, and he says: I was together with that girl. Then he would

    certainly inundate you with questions, why you kept this from him and it would lead to unnecessary

    misconceptions. Don't misunderstand me- losing virginity before marriage is a sin, but will be forgiven

    by God. However, in a normal relationship between two non-Muslims, the couple also talks about their

    past experiences. You love a person with or without the mistakes of their past. If Islam wanted us to trust

    each other blindy and forgive everything, it wouldn't have encouraged us to enquire about the person you

    want to spend the rest of your life with. From a jurisprudential perspective, it is right not to talk about the

    past. From a human perspective, I'd say that it is better to be honest from the beginning to avoid mis-

    conceptions. I think many girls would like to know if the guy they want to marry had a past relationship....

    Of course, the character of a person shouldn't be judged by past mistakes, but honesty is very important

    and seeking repentance from Allah is a spiritual issue- it shouldn't open the door for hypocracy.

    Personally, this virginity issue is getting on my nerves. So many brothers had sex before marriage, it's not

    visible-fault concealed,Mashallah. The woman made a mistake, oh my god, let the whole community know.

    No, the whole world. Confront him with this issue, it's not a big deal, why hide it? Did you kill a person?

    Did you take a knife and kill your neighbour? You can test his character that way. Did the prophet s.a.v.a.v.s

    care about the virginity of his wives, among which the majority was widowed or divorced? Come on,

    sis, let's end this hypocracy. Tell him you love him, you don't care about the past, so why should he

    care about yours. This is your freedom and it's always god to let the cat out of the bag at the beginning.

    As it concerns intimacy and your private relationship, it's better to mention it. If he takes it too seriously,

    and wants a virgin, he doesn't deserve you.

    This is my personal opinion, apart from the religious perspective in terms of covering mistakes

    • Jannah, I understand your point. And your scenario of running into the ex, and the cat being let of the bag, followed by a loss of trust, is certainly something to think about. But how much are you proposing to reveal? Where do you draw the line? Do you say, "I had two boyfriends before you and I am not a virgin anymore. Since then I made my tawbah and I don't do that anymore." Okay, that sounds reasonable. But what if your fiance (for example) asks, "Did you have sex with both of those men? How many times? Did you have oral sex? What else did you do? Did you do it in his house, or where?" Etcetera. If you start answering these questions then you are getting into a very ugly scene of revealing past sins and putting evil images in the man's head. I don't think these things should be discussed at all.

      As a man, if I am interested in a woman, even if I hear or suspect that she was not a good Muslim in the past, I am not going to ask her about past boyfriends or sexual experience at all. As long as she is a good Muslimah now, that's all I care about. I will not ask because I don't want to know. I am a jealous person. I don't want to know how many boyfriends she had, or who they were, or who she slept with. I prefer to assume that she is pure, or assume the best about her, and leave it at that. And I assume that we will never run into her "ex" because I assume that she no longer has any contact with that person.

      That's my opinion, and Allah knows best.

      Wael
      IslamicAnswers.com Editor

  5. Salam Brothers and Sisters

    For the past 3 years, i have been in a relationship with with my boyfreind. In them 3 years, wev only been physical 2-3 times (May Allah forgive us), but it wasnt anything to do with body. Wev had problems, then we stopped linking each other. after a year of having relationship problems due to him not being serious about us anymore because he wanted to have sex and i didnt give in, he started to ignore me and stopped giving me attention. Its been two years since we havnt met, and hes changed soo much. before he used to always get in to trouble, smoke ganja and all sorts of bad things. now hes a really changed man. he fears Allah very much. he sais he wants to marry me, and that i should wait for him for another 3 years or so, but in that 3 years were not allowed to talk on the phone or anything, he will email me once in a while to let me know how he is.
    But temptations ruining me, and i really want some help. i dont want to think about him 24/7, because thats all i do. and sometimes when i miss him, i lose control and do all crazy sorts. I want to be able to be that Muslimmah who's constantly thinking of Allah swt. iss there any dua;s or surahs to help me get rid of that feeling ?

    Shukran

    • Sister

      If you both want to marry, why torture yourselves by waiting for three years?

    • Sister are you sure that hes not leading you on? 3 yrs a long time. I know its hard but try your utmost best not to think about him. Turn to Allah- do tawbah (Prophet SAW used to seek forgiveness 70x a day!) Nex t time this guy pops into your head - try to do something else. you pray 5x right? if you dont then definetly start - its the 1st thing we are questioned about on day of judgement.Read Qur'an. Tahajjud (night prayers) are good. (in the last 3rd of night) - this is also best time to make dua to Allah swt, read Qur;an - an generally imrpove your relationship with your creator. I pray you find peace sister.Busy yourself with halal useful activities. (I took some courses when I was goin through a difficult time- mainly islamic ones to get me closer to Allah swt- I started learning the language of the Qur'an - trust me it became such a passion of mine learning this beautiful language - it kept my mind preoccupied with good things. (I still love it now) Keep busy sister. Move on. If this guy is meant to be, it will happen - dont hang on to him and always stick to islamic guidlines - dont talk to him/meet him etc - as what may lead to zina is zina.

      after some time (especially doing these things)- you will move on. If he comes into your life the islamic way - (comes as asks your parents for your hand) then consider it - otherwise dont - there are too many cases of people waiting for someone who never comes. Otherwise if you are of marriagable age (and after u have moved on InshaAllah consider beginning your search in halal way.)

    • Allāhumma innī a'ūdhu bika mina'l hammi wa'l hazan wa a'ūdhu bika mina'l-'ajzi wa'l kasal wa a'ūdhu bika minal jubni wa'l bukhl wa a'ūdhu bika min ghalabati'd dayn wa qahri'r-rijāl (once) 26. O Allāh! I seek refuge in You from anxiety and grief, and I seek refuge in You from weakness and laziness, and I seek refuge in You from cowardice and miserliness, and I seek refuge in You from being overwhelmed by debt, and the tyranny of men.

      Hasbunallahu wa ni'mal-wakeel. Allah is sufficient for us and is the best one to put trust in.

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