Islam allows polygamy and permits men, under specific circumstances, to possess at most four wives at any given time.
Women do not give birth before men, but statistics show that the number of girls who can marry is usually higher than the number of men.
Polygamy was customary before Islam and wasn't abrogated with the approach of Islam; instead, Islam has corrected and set various conditions for the practice. The principle was legal, but polygamy was limited to four wives.
By allowing polygamy, Islam has no intention of siding and inspiring with men. Rather, Islam’s aim is to uphold the spread of women’s natural rights—the right to marriage, forming a family, and having and rearing legitimate children. Of course, men's rights were also taken into account. The admitting of polygamy, while observing prescribed conditions, may be a social necessity and within the ultimate interests of both women and men, and to elucidate this matter, the subsequent two premises are indicated.
First premise:
Statistics show that the number of girls who can marry is usually higher than the number of men. There are two reasons:
First, the morbidity of men, especially young men, exceeds that of women and ladies. This can be manifested in relation to victims of incidents like war, falling from heights, being buried under debris, drowning, mortality in mines and industry, traffic accidents, work accidents, etc., thanks to these accidents, which don't seem to be few, the balance between men and by women and therefore the ratio of girls to men is increasing. This is often evident within the human toll of recent wars like the wars in Iraq and Iran, America and Iraq, Russia and Afghanistan and their internal wars, Serbia and Bosnia, and other wars and acts of aggression occurring round the world. The human toll in these battles is monstrously high, and most deaths involve men and youngsters who are either unmarried or recently married before their deaths. Now consider the rise in the number of girls over men as a result of these wars.
Second, some scientists claim that women's resistance to disease is on top of men's. Studies of the deaths of youngsters, adolescents, and young adults support this theory. The typical life expectancy of girls is longer than that of men. Statistics show a better proportion of widowed women than widowed men.
So the number of single women who want and want to get married is over the number of single men who need and wish to want marriage. We've all seen many widowed women who want to remarry a desirable man, but cannot because of circumstances. On the opposite hand, there aren't many single men who want to get married who can't find a girl willing to and get married.
Second premise:
One of the natural rights of all human beings is the right to marry and found a family; just as people have a right to a job, a home, health and hygiene, food and clothing, they also have a right to marriage. All people, male and female, have the right to marry, to enjoy family peace and love, to develop lasting emotional bonds, and to bear and raise legitimate children. As human beings, women have this right. Social laws must be regulated so that this natural right is easily accessible to all.
In short, in every society there are large numbers of unmarried women who need and want to marry, and if they do not, they can be driven into deviance and corruption. The number of single men who are willing to marry widows is not large enough to satisfy the demands of every society, for the reason that young men generally prefer to marry previously unmarried women, of whom there are already more than enough to satisfy their numbers. So what must widows who want to remarry do? In this case, society must either accede to freedom, corruption and wantonness, as accepted in the West, or, as in Islam, a polygamous system must follow.
In order to solve this problem for the benefit of widowed women who want to marry and possibly start a family, and to prevent social corruption, Islam permitted polygamy.
Another justification for polygamy is the sterility or incapacity of the spouse. If a woman is completely sterile or her pregnancy is harmful due to an incurable disease and her husband feels the need for a child, reason and conscience give consent to his right to enter into a new marriage.
Moreover, if one's wife is ill and cannot satisfy her husband's needs, it becomes imperative for the man to remarry. To solve this problem, a man must either divorce his first wife or remarry without divorcing her. The second option is advantageous for the first wife because she is not suffering from her illness and is not alone.
However, it must be emphasized that since the most important benefit of marriage is family love, peace and affection, monogamy is much more advantageous than polygamy. Moreover, Islam does not encourage men to remarry to satisfy their lust and sacrifice family love and peace for fleeting pleasures. The reason why Islam approaches polygamy is as a result of social necessity and to protect the rights of widowed women and women who need to get married.
Conditions of time, place, society, and personal resources and facilities differ on this issue. If there is no personal or social necessity for polygamy, monogamy is preferable, and if polygamy is required in society or in some individuals, women and men must cooperate in achieving this goal. A man who intends to remarry for any of these reasons must stick to his financial and physical means, and if he does not have the means to maintain two households, he must renounce remarriage. Then, if he has the means, he must discuss the matter with his wife and prove to her the necessity of remarriage, assure her that he will observe justice and equality between his wives, and obtain her consent by any fair means possible.
The duty of such a wife is self-sacrifice in order to provide for personal and social needs; she must put aside harsh emotions, attend to the plight and needs of her husband or widowed women, and above all, she must think of God's satisfaction and thus grant her husband his rightful request.
If the remarriage is the result of the mutual consent of the spouses, it will be much less problematic for everyone involved
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