Al-Azhar Sheik Muhammad Al-Mussayyer on Wife Beating in Islam

Sheikh Muhammad Al-Mussayar, an Egyptian professor at Al-Azhar University was interviewed on a religious ruling program on the Saudi-based Iqra TV on June 7, 2004. During the show, the sheikh explained the rules regarding wife beating in Islam. Following are excerpts from his comments:

Moderator: We have received an unsigned fax saying, "my husband always beats, abuses, and curses me in front of the children and then hastens to make up with me. When I reproach him for this, for his bad behavior towards me, he says, 'I don't think or feel the things I say to you, it is only a temporary anger. Allah has ordered us in the Koran to beat in order to discipline the wife.' I would like to know the Islamic ruling on this issue and what to tell my husband."

Sheikh Al-Massir: Dear Sir, marital life must be based on love, affection and good values. This man, this husband who hurts his wife with curses and abuse to the point of beatings does not behave justly. However, if he gets so aggravated that he cannot even remember why, I advise the wife not to annoy him so much. The relationship between them should be such that she will not irritate him and he will take some control over his nerves and try to be tolerant towards his wife.

As for beatings, Islam is innocent. The claim that Islam orders unrestrained beating of one's wife is wrong. The Prophet said, "The evil among you are those who beat." The stage of beatings comes when we despair of reforming the ways of some women by good advice or by abandoning them in the bed.

Moderator: What are the beatings allowed in Islam?

Sheikh Al-Massir: Beatings that are not hard and do not harm the face or leave marks. And not in front of the children. Yes, but it's important to know what kind of a woman is beaten?

Moderator: Yes, who is she?

Sheikh Al-Massir: She is a wife who rebelled against her husband's advice and abandoning her in bed did not help.

Moderator: According to the verse, "Those of them on whose part you apprehend disobedience?"

Sheikh Al-Massir: ?They were preached, abandoned in the bed and beaten. But when do you beat? When the wife is not good. If the wife is good, talking is enough. If talking does not help, abandoning her in bed is enough. A woman for whom marital life is important suffers when she is left alone in the bed.

If we get to a point where abandonment does not pain her and words do not deter her, we may have come to the stage of beatings. But when and what kind of beating? I advise the brother to repent, ask his wife for forgiveness and try not to be angry.