STABILITY IN MARRIAGE
Presently, the Islamic spirit has almost vanished from the responsibilities of arranging and performing a marriage. Muslims nowadays prefer to follow local customs rather than the guidelines of Islam. A misguided practice is the fixing of heavy dowers—by the brides’ families, which is considered to be safeguarding the girls’ interests. The Dictionary of Islam says: “The custom of fixing heavy dowers, generally beyond the husband’s means, especially in India, seems to be based upon the intention of checking the husband from ill-treating his wife, and, above all, from his marrying another woman, as also from wrongfully or causelessly divorcing the former. For in the case of divorce, the woman can demand the full payment of the dower.
Fixing a substantial dower rests on the supposition that it has to be fixed at the time of marriage but not handed over on that occasion. This gives it a “deterrent” value, not otherwise possible, i.e., if it was immediately paid.
What parents try to achieve—unsuccessfully—through the fixing of heavy dowers is stability in their daughters’ marriages. Stability in marriage cannot come from manipulation of the dower or other material considerations. Stability in marriage comes out of the girl’s appreciation of the realities of life, for which a keen awareness of the root cause of familial and societal problems is essential. The commonest manifestation of these are quarrels with in-laws and sometimes even the breaking up of the home.
The bride comes from her parents' home, where she has had unstinted affection. This relationship and the place in the family are usually taken for granted. She is unaware that these valuable elements in family living are not hers for the taking when she enters her new home as a married woman. They have to be earned. She has to show that she deserves the kind of love and regard she has as a matter of right in her parents’ home. This lack of awareness is often the cause of major rifts in her married life.
There is unconditional love in the case of blood relationships. Her parents love her, whether she is good or bad, active or idle, or helpful, regardless of the circumstances of her life and her character. With no such blood relationship with her in-laws, love from them will never be unconditional. It will be directly related to the impression her character and abilities make upon them in daily living. For the bride, entering the marriage bond is like undergoing a series of tests, the outcome of which will determine whether her married life will be stable and happy. Wise parents will warn their daughters to mould themselves to new sets of circumstances.
A woman who enters marriage with a correct appreciation of what is required of her will make the transition with ease. Through her character and accomplishments, she will earn the same honourable position in her in-laws’ home as she had in her parents’ home. Daughter-in-Law does not consider her in-laws' house as her own home, which results in the in-laws’ family members also failing to accept her as part of their family. The girl ends up paying the price by needlessly suffering in her in-laws' home, putting herself through psychological torment unnecessarily. Such conflicts are the price of one's own lack of awareness, which naive girls often attribute to their in-laws.
Such a situation is invariably aggravated when her parents attempt to intervene. In a clash between the weak and the strong, it is always the former who suffers, and of course, within the bonds of marriage, it is always the woman who is in the weaker position. Parents do not realize the damage they do to their own daughter’s life by waging an unending war against her in-laws.
The parents-in-law’s home is a kind of training and testing ground in which the girl must be willing to learn, to adapt, and to prove her mettle. She must leave behind her the fairy tale existence of her parent’s home. It is the girl who is prepared to look at the hard facts of life in the face which will make her marriage a resounding success.
