A woman is not obliged to tell people how many times she was divorced

13-12-2015 | IslamWeb

Question:

Assalaamu alaykum wa rahmatullaah. If you have been divorced more then once, is it necessary to tell people or is it ok to mention that you have been divorced but not how many times? Or do you have to tell the person that you will be marrying how many times you have been divorced? Just to protect your reputation as in the Indian/Pakistani culture it is considered a bad thing, so people do not want to expose these things as people will not marry them if they have been divorced more then once. Thank you .

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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 ʻalayhi wa sallam, is His slave and Messenger. 

You are not obliged to tell anyone of your divorce or the number of divorces as some may assume that the reason for it was a defect in you or that you have a bad nature or the like. This includes future suitors who would propose to marry you. You are not obliged to inform a suitor of your previous divorce in the first place or the number of divorces unless he stipulates that you should be a virgin; in this case, it is not permissible to deceive him by not telling him that you are not a virgin.

However, it may be better to tell him of your divorce so that he would be given all the facts ahead; he might be seeking a wife who has not been previously married or a previously married woman who was not separated from her husband by divorce.

Allaah knows best.