Marriage in Islam

In Islam, nikah (Arabic: نِكَاح, romanized: nikāḥ) is a contract exclusively between a man and woman. Both the groom and the bride are to consent to the marriage of their own free wills. A formal, binding contract – verbal or on paper – is considered integral to a religiously valid Islamic marriage, and outlines the rights and responsibilities of the groom and bride. Divorce in Islam can take a variety of forms, some executed by a husband personally and some executed by a religious court on behalf of a plaintiff wife who is successful in her legal divorce petition for valid cause. Islamic marital jurisprudence allows Muslim men to be married to multiple women (a practice known as polygyny).

In addition to the usual marriage until death or divorce, there is a different fixed-term marriage known as zawāj al-mut'ah ("temporary marriage")^: 1045 permitted only by the Twelver branch of Shi'ite for a pre-fixed period.^: 242 There is also Nikah Misyar, a non-temporary marriage with the removal of some conditions such as living together, permitted by some Sunni scholars.