#258: Ruling on a Wife Denying her Husband access to Intercourse on the Basis of His Disobedience to Allah
QUESTION
_”What if the wife deny him because of a valid reason, i.e if the husband disobey His Lord???”_
*ANSWER*
Alhamdulillāh.
The Ulamā have formed a consensus that it is not permissible for a woman to deny her husband access to the legal sexual intercourse that is his right on no account.
This is based on the Hadīth that has come in this regard.
As for refusing him on account of the sins he commit, then it depends on the gravity of such a sin. If it is a sin that is Kufr and he does it unrepentantly and repeatedly, then what is obligatory upon the wife is to seek for a divorce. This is wājib.
If however it is just a sin, then it is obligatory upon her to make Nasīhah to him, not to boycott him on the bed as this is tantamount to making him transgress the limits of Allāh the more and it is not likely to make him stop.
Now, what if he smokes or drinks and the smell of it harms her, some of the Ulamā have granted her a dispensation regards to that.
It has come in _’Al-Fatāwah Al-Fiqhiyya Al-Kubrā’_ by Ibn Hajar Al-Haytamī – rahimahullāh:
_”And he was asked about a wife that refuses her husband access to her due to his stink and the many ness of the dirts he has on him. Would she be regarded to as being Nāshizah (rebellious)? He answered by saying: ‘she won’t be by so doing rebelious. It is like any other (dirt and filth) that was obligatory on the wife to get rid of from herself(for her husband) as it has come in the book ‘Al-Bayān ‘an An-Nass’ that it is obligatory upon the husband to get rid everything by which a person feels abhorent (whenever he approaches his wife)”_
But it should be noted that this does not justify the wife to boycot her husband for that which she feels is abhorrent without proof. Rather what this Fatwah says that whatever really harms her of him should be gotten rid of by him before inter course. Therefore her duty is to tell him her situation that it hurts her and she should encourage and help him get rid of same and once that is done, she is obliged to allow him access to him.
Some women do not understand the wisdom of the Sharī’a in this and they think it is a way if giving men a heavy hand over women. This isn’t the case. How many a family out there have been destroyed by virtue of the rebellious attitude of women?
We ask Allāh for Guidance and mercy.
Bārakallāhu fīkum
Jazākumullāhu Khayran
📚 *IslamNode* ُ
