i have been married for 9 years. after the first year of our marriage, i said the divorce words to my wife all in one breath out of EXTREME stress, anger and rage over an argument. my family never let my wife live in peace and i was too blinded to see my wife's innocence. in most of the cases, it was my family that was at fault. after i said these words, my mother did not let my wife leave the house and neither did my wife wanted to leave the premises. my mother sought a fatwa from a scholor and got to know that circumstances in which i said the word 3 times allowed me to "ruju" back to my wife, which i did the same night as we both knew we cudnt live without each other. we were madly in love with each other. my wife and i have 3 children (the 1st she had already conceived when we had that quarrel and the other 2 came later on). now my wife and i r having issues again and we havent been financially stable as well. she thinks its all because there was probably a wrong fatwa taken back then and our marriage was not intact. please kindly let me know at the earliest whether we r still a married couple or had our marriage ended back then. what about the other 2 kids that we had after that incident?

All perfect praise be to Allaah, The Lord of the Worlds. I testify that there is none worthy of worship except Allaah, and that Muhammad is His slave and Messenger.

If the scholar that was asked about this incident is trustworthy in his knowledge and religion, then it is permissible to act according to his Fatwa. In this case, taking back your wife is valid and the marriage is valid, so you should not pay any attention to your whispers about this, and those children should be traced back to you in all cases without any difference of opinion among the scholars in this regard. For more benefit on the ruling of repeating the word divorce three times, please refer to Fataawa 86743 and 84170.

Furthermore, you should not think about the previous Fatwa or make it a reason for the non-stability of your family. Rather, you should look for other reasons of this dispute and work towards solving them. Also, it should be noted that marital life is hardly free from problems, but one should be wise and calm in solving it and each spouse should overlook the mistakes of the other as much as possible especially that you are blessed with children. Problems have always negative effects on the children.

Indeed, we find it very strange how you and your wife love each other very much and you claim that you cannot live without each other while you are unable to solve the disagreement before reaching the stage of divorce?  

As regards the financial instability, if you mean that there is not enough money for buying the necessities of life, then the matter of provision is in the hands of Allaah, so you should take the possible means and then supplicate Allaah earnestly and seek His help. Allaah Says (what means):  {So seek from Allaah provision and worship Him and be grateful to Him. To Him you will be returned.}[Quran 29:17]

Besides, ‘Umar said: “I heard the Prophet saying: "If you were to rely on Allaah as He should be relied upon, you would be provided for in the same way birds are provided for, they set forth empty stomach and they return satiated.” [Ahmad and Ibn Maajah]

On the other hand, if material lack is a reason for these problems, then you have an example in the Prophet ; many months would pass by while no fire is lit in his house in order to cook food; they lived merely on dates and water only as ‘Aa’ishah informed us. Even though, he used to live a happy life with his wives and he was the best amongst the people to his wives and the latter also were among the best examples of wives.