A 13-year-old girl in the Islamic Republic of Iran is getting a bit long in the tooth for getting married, and now there is an app for that. Iran International reported last Sunday that “an investigation by the reformist daily Shargh found that a licensed Iranian matchmaking platform lets parents sign up children as young as 13 for marriage, with no age filters or meaningful safeguards in place.” Those who are familiar with the life of Muhammad as he is depicted in traditional Islamic sources, and with Islamic law, will find it odd that the matchmaking site sets the age that high.
Iran International stated that “the website Adam and Hava (Adam and Eve), which brands itself as a formal marriage intermediary, allows users to open profiles either for themselves or for a child or relative.” To test what was going on at the Adam and Hava site, Shargh investigators created a fictional profile of a girl who was born in 2012, and had no trouble posting it, “indicating,” Iran International points out, “that minors can be listed seamlessly as marriage candidates.”
The Adam and Hawa site has a registration form consisting of 80 questions, and exactly none of them deal with issues of “consent, emotional readiness or psychological maturity for minors.” The site’s executive manager, Mohammad-Hossein Asghari, took refuge in the law of the Islamic Republic, pointing out that “Article 1041 of the Civil Code sets the marriage age at 13 for women and 15 for men.” Therefore, “from a legal standpoint we are obliged to accept membership and cannot block someone who falls within the age range set by law.”
Of course. And it’s not just Iran. The Associated Press reported in Jan. 2025 that “Iraq’s parliament passed three divisive laws Tuesday, including amendments to the country’s personal status law that opponents say would in effect legalize child marriage.” The amendments “would let clerics rule according to their interpretation of Islamic law, which some interpret to allow marriage of girls in their early teens — or as young as 9 under the Jaafari school of Islamic law followed by many Shiite religious authorities in Iraq.”
This was done in order to bring the nation’s laws into line with Islam: “Proponents of the changes, which were advocated by primarily conservative Shiite lawmakers, defend them as a means to align the law with Islamic principles and reduce Western influence on Iraqi culture.”
AP says that the approval of child marriage comes from Iraqi clerics’ “interpretation of Islamic law,” but actually, this is not some eccentric interpretation. This is standard, basic Islam. Islamic tradition records that Muhammad consummated his marriage with (i.e., raped) Aisha when she was nine, and the resultant fact that child marriage and the sexualization of children are taken for granted in wide swaths of the Islamic world: “The Prophet wrote the (marriage contract) with Aisha while she was six years old and consummated his marriage with her while she was nine years old and she remained with him for nine years (i.e. till his death)” (Bukhari 7.62.88). Muhammad was at this time fifty-four years old. Numerous other early Islamic traditions state the same thing.
Marrying young girls was not all that unusual in Muhammad’s time. But because, in Islam, Muhammad is the supreme example of conduct (cf. Qur’an 33:21), he is considered exemplary in this even today. For that reason, Iran and Iraq are not alone in making Muhammad’s example the basis of their laws regarding the legal marriageable age for girls.
The News Agency of Nigeria reported back in June 2021 that “the Chief Imam of the Nasrul-lahi-li Fathi Society of Nigeria (NASFAT), Abdul Azeez Onike, says Islam supports underage marriage.” Onike insisted that “Islamic scripture was clear about marriage” and called upon people to refer to Islamic texts “instead of using contemporary standards” to determine whether or not child marriage was an acceptable practice. Onike was right: child marriage has abundant attestation in Islamic tradition and law. Numerous Islamic authorities worldwide attest to this. Turkey’s directorate of religious affairs (Diyanet) said in Jan. 2018 that under Islamic law, girls as young as nine can marry.
Ishaq Akintola, professor of Islamic Eschatology and Director of Muslim Rights Concern, Nigeria, has said, “Islam has no age barrier in marriage and Muslims have no apology for those who refuse to accept this.” An Iraqi expert on Islamic law, Dr. Abd Al-Hamid Al-‘Ubeidi, agreed, saying, “There is no minimum marriage age for either men or women in Islamic law. The law in many countries permits girls to marry only from the age of 18. This is arbitrary legislation, not Islamic law.” So does Dr. Salih bin Fawzan, a prominent Muslim cleric and member of Saudi Arabia’s highest religious council: “There is no minimum age for marriage” and girls can be married “even if they are in the cradle.” Pakistan’s Council of Islamic Ideology has declared flatly: “Islam does not forbid marriage of young children.”
Related: Washington State City Councilwoman Under Fire for Opposing What No Sane Person Should Support
Yet despite all this, worldwide organizations dedicated to ending child marriage universally fail to acknowledge its justifications in Islam. The UN High Commissioner of Human Rights never mentions Islam in connection with child marriage. UNICEF doesn’t, either. Nor does the international network Girls Not Brides.
Until the root cause of why child marriage continues to be prevalent in some areas is acknowledged, the problem will never be solved, and more girls will suffer.
The establishment media will never tell you anything about the root causes of child marriage. For that, you have to come to sites that aren’t afraid to tell unwelcome truths. That’s us: Join PJ Media VIP now and use promo code FIGHT to get 60% off your membership. Or join VIP Platinum for special access plus a chance to win one of five lifetime memberships.
