verse 4:3 and polygamy
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There is this one guy who studied Al Quran using studyquran.org and come up with the translation of 43 in which he believes that God forbids men from marrying 2 times 3 times and 4 times because in 2432 God tells us only to marry off singles among female and male.
Can someone please clarify this issue?
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Dr Shabbir
2432 And marry the single among you, (whether they are widowed, divorced or bachelors). And those who are still being kept as slaves, male or female, such of them as are fit to marry. If they are poor, Allah will enrich them with His Bounty, for, Allah is of Infinite means, All-Knowing.PM translation
2432 And marry off those among you that are single, and the good from among your male and female servants. If they are poor, then God will grant them from His grace. And God is Encompassing, Knowledgeable.024.032
YUSUFALI Marry those among you who are single, or the virtuous ones among yourselves, male or female if they are in poverty, Allah will give them means out of His grace for Allah encompasseth all, and he knoweth all things.PICKTHAL And marry such of you as are solitary and the pious of your slaves and maid-servants. If they be poor, Allah will enrich them of His bounty. Allah is of ample means, Aware.
SHAKIR And marry those among you who are single and those who are fit among your male slaves and your female slaves; if they are needy, Allah will make them free from want out of His grace; and Allah is Ample-giving, Knowing.
Is is marry or marry off? I think if it is marry - then it means you (the man) may not necessarily be single - but should marry a woman who is single (widowed/single/divorced etc)
I have no idea though - just a thought!But then if it is addressing the men - why would it include male slaves to marry/marry off? mmmm im confused!
It brings us right back to 43 and its meaning ?!? still no conclusions?
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024.032
YUSUFALI Marry those among you who are single, or the virtuous ones among yourselves, male or female if they are in poverty, Allah will give them means out of His grace for Allah encompasseth all, and he knoweth all things.Doesnt it mean that both the male and female gotta be single?
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Is is marry or marry off? I think if it is marry - then it means you (the man) may not necessarily be single - but should marry a woman who is single (widowed/single/divorced etc)
I have no idea though - just a thought!But then if it is addressing the men - why would it include male slaves to marry/marry off? mmmm im confused!
It brings us right back to 43 and its meaning ?!? still no conclusions?
You are answering yourself. It is not addressing "men". It is addressing both men and women, that's why.
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Peace Ay
With all due respect to the extensive and monumental work of Lane it has its limitations. If we can find the correct meaning for each and every word from his lexicon we will not be spending time debating so much about the Quraan. Lanes is 1200 years after the revelation and it is greatly influenced by many non Quranic interpretations and corruptions which happened in between that time. The Quraan is a great dictionary and if the meaning is wrong logic or linguistics will reject the word and beyond this the it should not give rise to contradictions.
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yes i forgot to add
i did a search for the word ayamait only appears in that form in 2432
(i use http//quran.muslim-web.com/ btw)
Im not sure AYM is the correct root after all... i did a root search and 116 verses came up with words from that root, but 2432 was not one of them. (unless i searched wrong - i will double check as soon as i get a chance)
ps. warner i agree with what you say about lanes - but it is something to consider also...
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Thanks Ay
I did a search and similar results as you.
The closest root I found was YWM (Ayyam plural of Yawm) periods /years/age.
Why singles and slaves in the same sentence. What is the connection between single among you and slaves? I think the first category should be in correlation to the second category.Also the verse lacks logic if ayama means single.
Unless we rearrange the verse like this then it makes sense with single.
marry singles among you and singles among your male and female slaves
But we are not supposed to rearrange the Quraan.
If we take ayama as single it may give the meaning that you should marry singles among you but the single rule is not applicable to slaves.
The last part of the verse if they are in poverty referrs to whom? To only the salves or Slaves and ayama both.
Also this verse is not a command it is an advice or a recommendation.
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mmmmm im getting really frustrated with this polygany issue - it seems to get more and more complicated the more i look into it, and the quran is meant to be clear and understandable - so why all this ambiguity?!?! brickwall
I mean the root AYM gives the result single
but that is getting the root from the plural wordand like u said then it gets confusing with the rest of the sentence!
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Peace Samia
Ahad, wahad,farada,yaghla; There should be one or two more you should be able to tell us. I do not see any connection with ayama in root or in succession to single/solitary/alone.
What is the root of ayama and where does this come from ?
Do one, only, individual, one by one ; have the same meaning? Does any of these words mean single?
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Assalaamu alaikum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuhu
Marry those among you who are single, or the virtuous ones among yourselves, male or female if they are in poverty, Allah will give them means out of His grace for Allah encompasseth all, and he knoweth all things. (2432)
This particular translation of the verse may confuse people, because here marry means arrange a marriage. That is clear from the translation of Picktall And marry such of you as are solitary and the pious of your slaves and maid servants
Basically, a person's single slaves and servants should be married, because marriage is a natural state. Slaves and servants may not be able to afford marriage on their own, so their masters have been told in this verse to help them out in that regard. This verse should in no way be miscontrued as to prohibit polygamy, which has been clearly made permissible in the Holy Quran Marry women of your choice, two or three or four (43)
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Salaam warner and ay
The root is AYM, as ay mentioned; and the singular is ay-yem. Originally the word ay-yem is given to a snake (a white snake) which is known to be a docile, tameable and non-poisonous snake . They are also known to prefer solitude.
The plural ayaamaa is for both genders.
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Peace Samia
How originally?
If your theory on arriving at the meaning of ayama as single is because of some snake by the same name was known to prefer solitude then there are thousand similar explanations with similar stories in traditional books explaining the meaning of many words in the Quraan . The best one is the original name of makkah is bakkah because someone was weeping 5000 years ago at that place under a balsam tree.
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Peace Samia
How originally?
If your theory on arriving at the meaning of ayama as single is because of some snake by the same name was known to prefer solitude then there are thousand similar explanations with similar stories in traditional books explaining the meaning of many words in the Quraan . The best one is the original name of makkah is bakkah because someone was weeping 5000 years ago at that place under a balsam tree.
Salam warner
Words can be traced back to the first word that emanated from their root. The first word is usually something from the environment or everyay life where the language was born; then the abstract and other meanings follow. That's how a language grows. This is not specific to Arabic. You can also find this in English and many other languages.
Your examples of makkah and bakkah show that you do not understand what the root is, how it starts and how it works. These two words do not even share the same root. Each has its own root.
When I say originally...", I mean that a single person was being compared to this snake, then it shared the same name with that snake.
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peace,
thanks sis samia for your valuable input!
So 2432 should read something like
And marry (off) the single among you, and those who are still being kept as slaves, male or female, such of them as are fit to marry. If they are poor, Allah will enrich them with His Bounty, for, Allah is of Infinite means, All-Knowing.ie. marry off your single slaves? (but why is there an "and" between single and slaves?)
i still feel very confused about the issue.
Polyandy (women having more than one husband) is not allowed as per 424
BUT
Polygamy is allowed, with an upper limit?
But then if we do interpret 43 as being about polygamy and an upper limit of 4 - then it brings me back to my original question at the start of the thread..... -
I tried to explain it like this before
2432 is the same as 629 in terms of wording. So if 2432 were not a prohibition of polygyny, neither would 629 be a prohibition of idolworship
Hasten to the remembrance of God (629)
Marry off the single (2432)In 629 God addresses the mosque-goer.
In 2432 He adreesses the registrar.In 629 the mosque-goer is ordered to remember God.
2432 the registrar is ordered to marry off the single.God forbids the mosque-goer to remember false gods such as al-Lat
because it is a wrong done to God. "God does not share His sovereignty." (1826).God forbids the registrar to marry off the married
because it is a wrong done to women (423). "God does not do the least wrong unto humans but it is humans who wrong themselves." (1044)What is unacceptable in my explanation?
Peace,
Hasan Akcay