Shi’ite Muslims believe in the practice of “temporary marriage” (mut`ah), in which a man can tell a woman he marries her, constituting a valid Muslim wedding, have sex with her, and then say he divorces her, constituting a valid Muslim divorce. It is the legalist’s dream, a way of having one-night stands or indulging in prostitution (a “dowry” is required) while still considering oneself righteous. A Muslim group, the MahdiUniteMuslims (MUM), is pushing the practice as the ultimate mosque-growth technique, the way Islam will ultimately convert America. Timothy Furnish reports on the history of mut’ah and quotes from a mosque-growth advocate:
For the past few weeks MUM — which is dedicated to uniting the Islamic world through belief in the Mahdi, the “rightly-guided one” of Islamic traditions who will create a global caliphate — has hosted a discussion about mut`ah, Shi`i temporary marriage, the “secret weapon that will convert the West to Islam in the later days before the advent of Imam al Mahdi” . . . .
And since “the craze about sex today is through the roof” (hard to argue there), mut`ah is not just man-made but “a divine plan,” for “when non-Muslim men learn that they can honorably have more women,” they “will flock to Shi`ah Islam. Sorry for the expression but Allah made women the bait” . . . . “When so many non-Muslim men come to Shi`ah Islam this will cause non-Muslim women to come to Shi`ah Islam too because an honorable and equitable polygynous mut`ah is better than being unmarried or just having flings with bad men, right?” Bottom-line: “This will cause a chain reaction of conversion to Islam from all corners. Even Sunnis will come to Shi`ah Islam because they want women.” In conclusion, this future editor of the Muslim Maxim pleads, “please do not hate mut`ah anymore. There is a reason for it. It is the secret weapon of the last days to bring the world to Shi`ah Islam.”
Can there be any doubt but that he is right? It would offer the religion people in our culture is yearning for, one that is BOTH permissive AND legalistic, allowing a person to be BOTH sinful AND self-righteous. Think of the felt needs this would tap into! We will soon be entering the age of the mega-mosque.
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I am sputtering with indignation over this despicable view.
There is HUGE doubt that he is right, given that this scenario operates independently of any knowledge of the psychology of women. Most women do NOT, at heart, look for multiple, serial partners because they’re after sex. They do it because they’ve been fooled into thinking that sex with a man is the first step towards love and marriage. Come to Shi’ah Islam for the prospect of multiple divorces!!! What a leap from the frying pan into the fire. I should think American women would instead convert to RC and take up convent life!
Somehow this gives a picture of a brothel where all the “ladies” are wearing a burka. And you wonder what progressive Shi’a will do in California…..
Ewe.
And this is different than the innovative practice in American churches of serial polygamy through divorce and remarriage? (If I’m not mistaken, condemned in the Book of Concord, even if the ‘reason’ is ‘difference of religion’)?
Pot, meet kettle, kettle, meet pot.
Anon,
Walk carefully lest you become the pot. There are times when a divorced person is free to remarry, and I would hesitate to call that person a serial polygamist.
But to get married (something you perform for yourself, with no need of church or state) and to then get divorced yourself, within a period of an hour, say, is something else entirely.
Shi’ite Muslims believe in the practice of “temporary marriage” (mut`ah), in which a man can tell a woman he marries her, constituting a valid Muslim wedding, have sex with her, and then say he divorces her, constituting a valid Muslim divorce.
Primitive. Here in the West, the Kennedys (Joe II in particular) managed to finagle an annulment after 12 years of marriage and two kids… or at least got away with it for a decade until the Vatican recently overturned the annulment.
Vieth,
No doubt, I was merely cautioning Anon above. I suppose because it is somewhat a sensitive issue for me, a man who once held his views, and became the pot.
no this mutah thing is really perverse. It is though legalism shining at its best. Forde says everyone is a theologian to some degree. I think we are all little lawyers trying to find loopholes in God’s law, and bargaining for a lighter sentence.
Anon, certainly some things we see in churches are also repulsive. God rightly condemns them as adulterous.
That said, I don’t think those cases always involve someone who is planning ahead of time to nullify the marriage covenent within an hour. All sin leads to Hell, absent Christ, but if we had to come up with a “lowerarchy” of sins, wouldn’t this ritualized prostitution come in on a lower rung than a relationship that fails over a period of months or years?
Jenna’s comment nails (no pun intended) what the inherent cruelty and abomination of this Shi’a practice is; men and women are not designed to “be one flesh” with another, and then be torn away, especially in the course of a single hour. It leaves a scar that does not easily heal, and I dare say explains a lot of divorces.
On the other hand, perhaps we should encourage the church-growth movement within Islam, given the way it’s taken the wind out of the sails of Western Christianity.
My husband shared this news bit with me a day or so ago, and I was dubious then and still am. I think the idea that mut’ah will send men flocking to Islam is wishful thinking on the part of MUM. Sex without commitment is already so much the accepted norm in our society that sadly, I don’t think most Americans need any religious sanction or justification for it. If one doesn’t see it as wrong, why does one need an excuse?
Chesterton has some insights into Muslim men in ‘The New Jerusalem’ second chapter. Too long to post here but if your interested the book is available for free to read or listen to. Google it.
This theory rests on the dubious assumption that the people in America who are screwing their brains out care about a god of any kind or in “honor.” This crazy idea won’t get any traction here.
Bror, the only time that is true, according to Scripture - a good five times alone in the New Testament, is when the spouse dies. Otherwise remarriage *is* adultery, not marriage, no matter who solemnizes it. The Sermon on the Mount, Matt. 19, Romans 7 and 1 Corinthians 7 all make this clear. Note: divorce is not adultery, remarriage while one’s lawfully covenanted spouse is still alive, is. You are free when she dies. She is free when you die. So it is written.
Dr. Veith, it is indeed a more radical version of what is already going on here, though in this country, there seems to be no need in the minds of most for marriage in the first place. What this new practice will do is allow devout Muslim men to assuage their consciences.
I think part of the problem is that most Christians in this country don’t know what a marriage -is-. They think it is a solemnization of sex. Or a civil contract. But Biblically, it is a blood covenant which can only be disolved by death. It is a much more serious thing. The New Testament even calls it a mysterion in the Greek, or sacramentum in the Latin (though it is not a sacrament in the sense in which Lutheran theology uses the term sacrament)
Manxman, many of those Americans living in the practice of fornication and adultery do believe in a god, but also believe in cheap grace.
Anon, I would help me take you a bit more seriously if you used a name of some sort.
I’ll let others discuss it with you, but your shallow and spotty treatment of marriage, divorce, remarriage, and adultery has all the earmarks of statements made without a sufficient knowledge of the subjects.
All I’ll put forward now is that there really are perfectly Biblically reasons for remarriage without adultery, beyond the death of a spouse. You’ve avoiding things in the NT, and aren’t even touching on things in the OT.
I’m not trying to defend all the practices of divorce today, just letting you know that your support for your ideas on marriage look pretty skimpy. Victoria’s Secrets might be able to make a pair of panties with those reasonings’ cloth-equivalents; they wouldn’t have any left over.
WebMonk,
I personally don’t consider adhering to the Bible to be shallow or spotty. Nor do I consider a comment section a place where only exegetical papers suitable for publication are posted. It seems to me that you are attacking the messenger, not the message. The only purpose from knowing my name would be to attack me, rather than the argument from Scripture. With the HRCs around, it is far wiser to be anonymous.
I am not avoiding anything in the New Covenant Scriptures, and have searched them extensively. The Mosaic Law regarding this was clearly abolished by Jesus Christ, as well also that we have a new law, a new covenant and a new high priest (Hebrews). As to Law and Gospel application; it is sin which is forgiven, a valid covenant of marriage is not a sin to repent and be forgiven of. Nor is knowingly, willfully, continuing in a sin a position which can receive forgiveness, for it is a turning of ones’ back on ones’ baptism. As I just noted, commenting is not the posting of an exegetical paper, so you are off-base in attacking as if it were, and drawing conclusions that you haven’t got the information to draw from. Originally, I was looking for loopholes that would allow me to date divorced women. The closer I examined the text, the more the loopholes disappeared. The wish for loopholes is wishful thinking. I really don’t think that they are present.
Bror,
Were you intending to lay a curse on me? What was your intention?
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