Woman making Hijrah without her husband Fatwa No: 82533
- Fatwa Date:4-1-2001
Can a married women make Hijrah without her husband?
Praise be to Allah, the Lord of the Worlds; and blessings and peace be upon our Prophet Muhammad and upon all his Family and Companions.
Before answering this question we would like to mention here some points:
First, it is prohibited for a woman to travel without being accompanied by a Mahram (unmarriageable person). The Prophet said: "No woman who believes in Allah and the Last Day should travel a distance of a day and night journey unless her Mahram is with her".
All the Muslim scholars agree that a woman should not travel without a Mahram.
As for travelling alone for performing Hajj or Umrah or migration from a non-Muslim country to a Muslim country, the Muslim scholars are of different opinions.
Qazi Ayaz said: 'The Muslim scholars agree that a woman should not travel in any trip except Hajj and Umrah unless being accompanied by a Mahram; they also agree that she can migrate from a non-Muslim territory to a Muslim territory without a Mahram. Although, travelling without a Mahram, is forbidden for the Muslim woman, it is permitted for her in exceptional cases such as migration from a non-Muslim country to a Muslim country'.
But the preponderant opinion is that she should not travel to perform Hajj or Umrah without being accompanied by a Mahram.
Second, the reason of migration should be clear and known to us so that we can give a clear answer, to your question.
Third, we could not perceive whether the husband of this woman is Muslim or not? If he is non-Muslim, then the marriage is null and she must not live with him. If he is Muslim why is she migrating alone leaving her husband?
Fourth, is this woman living in a non-Muslim country or in a Muslim country? Is she able to practice the rites of Islam in the place where she is living?
Based on what we mentioned before we want to say that if this woman is living in a non-Muslim country where she is not able to practice the Islamic rites or if she is facing trial being there then she can migrate with her husband to a place where she can freely practice Islam. If the husband does not agree to migrate she can migrate by herself (without a Mahram) to protect her religion.
Allah knows best.