Considering remarrying ex-husband with drug habit for sake of children
Fatwa No: 299233

Question

I have been married for 5 years with 2 little girls. My ex-husband divorced me a year and a half ago and since then he has been trying to get married again. We divorced because of his drug use( marijuana) and because I have been the sole provider financially since we got married. Also he kept his drug habit hidden from me until we were already married. I have been patient for 5 years and try to help him quite but the problem still persists. I'm afraid for my daughters if I don't remarry their father and I don't see myself marrying another man because of them. Since our divorce he has been making empty promises of having a consistent job and stop his drug habit but till this day he has done neither. I'm tired of waiting and putting so much hope and energy into him changing. Please I need advice as to if I should just put up with his drug habit and not providing financially and remarry this man for the sake of my children. Everyone in my community is encouraging me to just remarry him for the sake of my children and keeps telling me I can never remarry another man and trust him with my girls.

Answer

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, sallallaahu ‘alayhi wa sallam, is His slave and Messenger.

First of all, we ask Allaah Almighty to remove your distress and make a way out of your difficulty, and also to set your husband right, guide him to the Straight Path and allow him to repent. We advise you to supplicate for him as much as possible.

Drug use is a great evil, as drugs intoxicate like alcohol and have the same consequences in the Islamic law. Allaah says (what means): {O you who have believed, indeed, intoxicants, gambling, [sacrificing on] stone altars [to other than Allaah], and divining arrows are but defilement from the work of Satan, so avoid it that you may be successful.} [Quran 5:90]

Moreover, Ibn ‘Umar related that the Prophet, sallallaahu ‘alayhi wa sallam, said: “Every intoxicant is wine and every intoxicant is forbidden. He who drinks wine in this world and dies  habitually doing so without repenting will not drink it in the Hereafter.” [Muslim]

It is not forbidden for you to go back to your husband regardless of whether he has repented from using drugs, provided it was not the third divorce. However, if he has not repented, then living with him is a great hardship, but if the situation is as you mentioned, that you might not find another husband, and your daughters need their father, then it is alright for you to return to him, and may even be better for you to do so. However, you must renew the contract with your guardian's consent and the presence of witnesses. For more benefit, please refer to Fatwa 82541.

Allaah Knows best.

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