Is Re-Nikah permissible with the same person without any prior divorce?
Assalam Alaykum
May all of be blessed by His mercy and guidance from Him, Ameen.
I have known my fiance for almost 9 years now and am in a long distance relationship with him for 5 years. Alhumdulillah, we are going strong, and our families too have agreed upon our relationship and wish to get us married. We are un-officially engaged to each other with our families' consent.
Being in a long distance relationship since the beginning; I thank Allah for saving us from many sins and mistakes that people usually go through continuously by being together before marriage. However, both of us are too emotionally attached to each other. Both of us want to get married to each other as soon as possible. Off course, the first reason being for us, to be together, follow Islam in the best way possible and start a family. But to be honest, my major concern of getting married to him is to avoid any sins when we are together and alone. The problem so arises that sometimes, if he visits me (once in a year and half), although I have my dad around me, we manage to be alone sometimes and get physically intimate. Although we never went to any extremes, this has always made us regret and sinful of ourselves. We both have cried in repentance and at our helplessness.
Apart from this, being away from each other has made our relationship very weak and vulnerable through the years, still, Alhumdulillah we are together and love each other a lot. Now, I wish to go to the place he stays, for my future studies. But I wish to go there married so that we are not in a haram relaitonship. On my fiance's advice and my understanding, I requested my parents to make my relationship public and get me a nikah performed in a homely affair (only nikah, not the function) and then I can go and study being at the same place. This is also to save my relationship from going into further destruction. But my parents were not happy with my request as I have my elder sister yet to be married and unfortunately, we are not able to find good matches for her inspite of her growing age. (Please remember my sister in your dua'as).
Pressure started growing from my fiance's family for our marriage. I understand my family's point of view too, and at the same time I feel guilty that he has been waiting only for me all these years. Under this pressure, in a heated argument, he once swore on Quran that if his mom asks's my mother for a nikah, and if my mother says NO, then he will never marry me. On this, I got furious and I swore too, that until my sister gets married, I won't marry. And since that day, we regret our words and have been trying to cover up our swears. He is not letting his mom to talk to my mother, and I have not said at home that I swore such a thing. However, I am still set to go to Sydney (where he is) since my admissions are in the process. And now, after a year, my family wants me get married and go, even if my sister's wedding has not taken place yet. ( I know for sure that they are saying this unwillingly and disheartened.)
I wanted us to perform nikah, without our parent's knowledge and then later on marry normally with their happiness again. But with the swear, both of us are now hand-tied in this issue and cannot do anything about it.
Although I don't remember the exact words I would have used in the swear. I need clarifications on the following.
1. Since we took the oath in anger, is there any way we can repent and take our words back and do something to make our relationship lawful and healthy?
2. I want to know if a re-nikah with the same person is permissible under these circumstances.
3. I heard a less punishable sin is better than a grave one. I don't know whether to go against the oath is a bigger sin or unwantedly being drawn to fornication is a bigger sin. Or taking a step without parent's knowledge to avoid committing more sins, is any right either?
To what I see, the only option left with me is to avoid our presence until we get married and we don't know when we will? We are at a stage where everything is on a downfall (time, our age, our relationship, etc). This has built up helplessness in us and at many points even jeopardizes our relationship. Psychologically, I am also insecure that he might leave me one day by getting tired of waiting for me.
I can't explain my family or my parents the intensity of how much I love him and want to be with him. This is out of due respect to my family. At the same time, I can't share with anyone how guilty and resented we both feel when we commit any sin. We both struggle our way out to come out of it. We had even started reciting Quran to each other on video call, rather than talking wordly stuff and getting distracted. But nothing seems to be a permanent solution and this piles up our frustration of not being together. For my parents, their priority is right now my elder sister and they are worried too for many things. I don't think they realize what I am going through and I don't blame them either. What should I be doing? Can you please suggest something where I can save ourselves from sins, save this relationship and save everything else that is falling apart?
Please note that, to avoid our problem of physical intimacy, we try our best to be away, talk decent, avoid masturbations. I also observe voluntary fasts, we observe all possible time prayers, alhumdulillah, and even discuss hadeeths and quran together on the call. But being physically present in front of each other after such time gaps, we get weak. I hate the feeling of committing sins, while on the other hand I wear hijab and am religiously interested in performing good deeds.
Please advice. It is as if, Satan whispers in my ears " why are you offering so many prayers? why is your faith so strong? why are you even making attempts to be righteous and do good deeds? You are a sinful woman, and you always commit sins even after promising yourself to not commit sin. whatever you are doing is not going to fetch you any good as Allah is going to punish you anyway for your sins"
I know I must continue to perform my obligations inspite of anything, but these whispers sometimes demotivate me, and I feel like a hypocrite.
I need help.
~ Ruhool
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Salaam sister Ruhool.
9 years is a long time. Your priority for both of you should be to get married properly and openly! Making and breaking an oath is wrong, but risking fornication is a grave sin.
1) The oath you both made:
You should both make tawbah (ask forgiveness from Allah) for breaking an oath and pay kaffarah if you can (feed 10 people) or fast 3 days.
“Allaah will not punish you for what is unintentional in your oaths, but He will punish you for your deliberate oaths; for its expiation (a deliberate oath) feed ten Masaakeen (poor persons), on a scale of the average of that with which you feed your own families, or clothe them or manumit a slave. But whosoever cannot afford (that), then he should fast for three days. That is the expiation for the oaths when you have sworn. And protect your oaths (i.e. do not swear much). Thus Allaah makes clear to you His Ayaat (proofs, evidences, verses, lessons, signs, revelations, etc.) that you may be grateful”
[al-Maa’idah 5:89]
Answer Taken from http://islam-qa.com/en/ref/124274
2. . I want to know if a re-nikah with the same person is permissible under these circumstances.
I do not know if re nikah is permissible or not but you should not do nikah without your parents knowledge. One of the conditions of nikah is that it must be declared openly. You both should be known as husband and wife. Some scholars argue that secret marriages are not valid in Islam. Either way they are not right. Strongly advise you to do the nikah properly.
3. I heard a less punishable sin is better than a grave one. I don't know whether to go against the oath is a bigger sin or unwantedly being drawn to fornication is a bigger sin. Or taking a step without parent's knowledge to avoid committing more sins, is any right either?
I advise you to consider another option. From your post it seems like your family is unhappy to get you married before your sister gets married. But it doesnt seem like they are unwilling as you said "And now, after a year, my family wants me get married and go, even if my sister's wedding has not taken place yet. ( I know for sure that they are saying this unwillingly and disheartened.)" correct me if I am wrong
Sister it doesnt matter if they are disheartened, its not good to go against your parents but by not marrying you are both risking big sins. Your duty to Allah swt is your priority dear sister. Islam is easy, Allah does not want to make things difficult for us, it is your family doing so. It is also unfair on your sister, giving her so much pressure to marry. Those that marry in a huge rush due to pressure from other siblings 'waiting' often make wrong choices.
Sit them down and explain that you love them and want them to be happy but you both want to marry before you leave, its essential as you will both be spending time together. You do not have to reveal your past sins, just explain that it will make Allah happy for you to marry before you leave. Be understanding but do not budge on this. You must be brave and firm. Do not let them blackmail you or make you feel guilty. You marrying before your sister won't stop her from marrying at the time InshaAllah and if it does put a family off they are not worthy of your sister.
Begin preparing for a small nikah ASAP after this. Make tawbah for your past sins and try to avoid speaking unecessarily to your fiancee to avoid further sins and bring barakah to your marriage InshaAllah.
May Allah swt help you both and bless your marriage.
Ameen
Sara
IslamicAnswers.com Editor
Dear sister Sara
Firstly, I am very grateful to you for your advice and enlightening me on my issue. I had written my post in the month of Ramadan, as I was very disturbed due to the situation. Its almost three months now, and Alhumdulillah, things are much better on the sins front. We are anyway miles apart, there have been loads of fights lately and ultimately no intimacy even in talks. I feel bad for the differences pouring in, but I am glad that something is keeping us away from being loving to each other even on calls. About voluntary steps, Alhumdulillah, both of us have consciously made efforts to avoid each other and have cut down on our talks to a great extent. We have also come to certain rules and realizations which I would like to share with you later in this post.
When we had to take a decision on self control and voluntary backing off the ill habits, there were lot of conflicts, according to him, he could do ti only if he was totally cut from me in every way possible. That would mean not keeping in touch with me at all. And for me, I could fight the sins by being together but stopping each other or talking about deen and hadiths and sharing religious stories, reciting Quran, etc. I could not conceive the idea of not keeping in touch at all coz he is the only one I am close to and no one else knows me the way he does. I was not being understanding about this and there were disagreements and arguments. We are not on talking terms anymore and just call up to ask each others' wellness sometimes. After being so non co-operative and immature, Now.... I have realized that everyone has a different way to deal with things. If his way is by staying away from me, then be it. I should probably think of the larger picture that Allah is going to be pleased. Hence, I am as good as a single girl now.
About the repentance on our oaths, I shall share the post with him and we would do our best to repent. May we repent till our last breath for all the sins and anger we once endowed in ourselves.
Yes, I understand our priority should be to get married as soon as possible. The only problem with me is I expect my parents to take a stand and make a decision. I dont know if I am wrong in thinking so. But as a daughter, I feel very embarrassed or even ashamed to talk to them about my own marriage. Also, I feel that they must be too worried to even bring the thought to light. But as you mentioned, I shall muster some courage and explain it to them. Probably a small nikah ceremony before I leave would make things better even though it means having to displease a few hearts. Not few, I guess a lot. 🙂
Sara, sometimes I wonder, am I being too selfish about this whole thing? I even try to think from my fiance's point of view, and I feel extremely guilty for having him go through all this because of the circumstances at my home. And on the other hand, I feel bad for my sister that she will have to go through something if I get married before her. Ofcourse she will be happy for me, but somewhere I am going to stir up a lot of emotions in quite a few people here. And I feel bad, very bad when I think that I am the reason behind so many people's unhappiness. I guess, I will have to deal with it and choose what Allah would have preferred for me. A clean, pious life for my present and future, InshaAllah!
About the rules and realizations, I realized that I should probably behave like a normal fiancee with him. As if it was never a lover affair. I know its going to be difficult, but I could just be as normal as possible as the arranged marriages are fixed. To not talk much, avoid sharing things so that I dont get emotionally attached and try and imbibe all the good qualities of a decent woman to be married. I am sure he would like that about me. Coz in our relationship, I have been the chatter box and an initiator for everything except a few. Although he has loved that about me, I guess he will understand the change and would even love it someday. I just I hope I am able to pull this off. We are not on talking terms anymore and just call up to ask each others' wellness sometimes.
Alhumdulillah, I have become steadfast in my prayers and Quran recital again, and I am very very happy about that. And I thank God after every salah that I offer, as even a one time salah is like an achievement that defeated shaytaan. So I am very happy right now with my relationship with Allah and my Belief.
But I do get low a lot many times, especially when I have to sleep in the night, I cannot. Coz I keep missing our togetherness and all the happiness we shared even just by talking.
If only, it did not have to drag us into sins, we would have still been together with happiness.
I feel empty a lot many times as I was never a social person. All I had as a friend and everything was him. Now I am trying to catch up with my old friends and engage in social activities so that I don't be alone or miss him and be a chatter box with my girl friends. 🙂
Sara, please pray for me, please pray that I get the guidance from Him and take steps that would be in the best interest of everyone including me. Please pray for me.
Thanks a lot for hearing me out.
Really, thanks a lot.
R u married now with ur lover?