Riyadh: With the end of summer — a time when many weddings take place in Saudi Arabia and other GCC countries — the local media is rife with reports announcing religious edicts surrounding marriages.
Under new forms of marriage including Misyar, Misfar (travel), Misyaaf (summer), Siyahi (tourist), friendship and lastly Wanasa (conversation), many Saudi and Arab Gulf tourists — who spend their summer holidays abroad — are reportedly engaging in temporary marriages with young girls and divorcing them before returning home. All of these new forms have stirred religious, ethical and social controversies.
Shaikh Saleh Al Sadlan, a member of the Saudi Supreme Council of Senior Scholars and professors of higher religious studies at the Imam Mohammad Bin Saudi Islamic University, stirred a controversy by approving the Wanasa form of marriage, which does not include sexual relations between a man and his wife.
Al Sadlan said that scholars of the past had approved such a form of marriage, which focuses only on talking, without having sex.
This, he said, used to happen between old men, who needed attention, and young women who didn't mind giving it in return for the status and security associated with marriage.
He added that the wife — in a Wanasa form of marriage — enjoys all other rights including accommodation, a dowry and alimony. Al Sadlan made this ruling when answering a question from a woman who questioned the legitimacy of a marriage in which there was no sexual relationship between the couple.
Legalised
Dr Abdul Mohsin Al Obaikan, a member of the Shoura Council and a counsellor at the Justice Ministry, has also approved the Wanasa marriage, describing it as legal and as per Sharia.
However, Dr Mohammad Al Nujaimi, professor of Civil Studies at King Fahd Security College and a member of the Islamic Fiqh (jurisprudence) Academy, is totally against the Wanasa marriage, adding that he considers it illegal. "How could a woman abandon her rights to have sex in married life?" he said.
He said any woman who accepts this kind of marriage does it only for worldly gain. He added that if an old, sick man, suffering from a number of diseases, perhaps diabetes, high blood pressure or arthritis, married a woman who had the same diseases, just so he could talk to her, then the marriage might be permissible.
