If A Man Is Permitted To Have More Than One Wife, Then Why Can’t A Woman have More Than One Husband?

Islam teaches that, the Most Wise, Allah عَزَّوَجَلَّ has created men and women as equals, but not as identical beings. They are different, physically, biologically and physiologically and each has different capabilities. Their roles and responsibilities are therefore different but they complement one another.

Some may object to a man having the right to more than one wife by insisting that, in fairness, women should also be able to practice polyandry. However, the following few points could be part of the reason behind its prohibition by Allah Almighty عَزَّوَجَلَّ:

• One of the benefits of polygamy is that is solves the problem of women outnumbering men.
• In general, men are polygamous by nature while women are not.
• Islam assigns great importance to the recognition of parents, both the mother and the father. When a man has more than one wife, the parents of children born in such a marriage can easily be identified. But in the case of a woman marrying more than one husband, only the mother of the children born within the marriage would be known without resorting to laboratory tests. Psychologists tell us that children who do not know their parents, the father in particular, undergo severe childhoods.