Q. Just two months after their marriage, a couple had a dispute, and the woman rejoined her family. Her father insisted on divorce, when neither spouse wanted it. He sought the help of the police and threatened dire consequences for the husband and his family if the divorce is not completed. The husband was practically compelled to pronounce the word of divorce three times in the presence of witnesses, but even at the time, he had no intention to divorce her. He was only trying to remove threats to his family. Now the couple want to reinstate their marriage. What is their position?
(Name and address withheld)
A. There is first of all the question of the validity of the divorce. According to what the husband states in his letter, he only said the word of divorce under extreme duress and he had no intention to divorce his wife even at the time of saying it. In this case, the divorce does not take place.
The Prophet says: “Actions are but by intention, and each person will have only what he has intended.” In this case, the man’s intention was only to remove the pressure to which he was subjected and to avoid the threat of ill treatment of his family. If this is truly the case — and he is the only one who can be absolutely certain that it is — then no divorce has taken place. He remains married to his wife.
There remains, however, the fact that the divorce has been officially documented. The only way to deal with this is to register his marriage as a re-marriage. This will mean that he will have to go through the process of marrying his wife again under the provisions of the law of his country.
Perhaps I need to explain that even if the divorce was valid, and even if he intended to divorce his wife at the time, this counts as a single divorce, even though the word of divorce was said three times. Hadiths are clear that saying the word of divorce three times on the same occasion is forbidden, but counts as one divorce.
