Muhammad ibn Adam al-Kawthari – Is Marriage Over Zoom-Phone Valid

			Bismillah your Walkman you're walking
		

			Bismillah Alhamdulillah wa Salatu was Salam ala Rasulillah overread respected brothers and sisters
salam Wa alaykum Warahmatullahi Wabarakatuh.
		

			I would like to discuss with you today a very important issue that I've been asked about recently
from many people have been asking, which is what is the Islamic ruling on conducting and carrying
out marriages and nigger over zoom online, over the phone, etc. And I felt that a lot of people have
misunderstood or they've not really understood what an HCA is Islamically and how an HCA takes
place.
		

			There are people who because of lockdown, etc, and the COVID situation, they've been asking whether
you can do any go online, so the brothers in one country, the sister is in another country,
		

			the witnesses are in another country, etc, etc. So there's a lot of people who a lot of people are
asking about in marriages online, on zoom on phone, etc. So I want to explain briefly, how a Decart
takes place and what are the basic requirements of any gar and what I will discuss inshallah will be
mainly based on the Hanafi school of thought, but it's more or less same in other methods as well
with slight differences in some, you know, side issues. So there might be some differences which
should be checked in other mother had been shot longtime.
		

			So what is a marriage? Nikka? And how does a marriage take place in Islam?
		

			To be honest, marriage, a * is a very simple affair, it takes place very easily, like in a
matter of few seconds, five seconds it takes to get married. Like I always say Nikka and Bullock,
marriage and divorce both take place really, really quickly and very easily divorced, allow a man
says to his wife, he has divorced her, it took two seconds, I have divorced, you took two seconds,
he's saying to his wife, I have divorced you in two seconds, but up to place marriage ended.
Likewise, Nicola has Well, there's only two statements, you have a statement of what we call an
offer a job. And the statement of Kaboul which is acceptance. So you have these two statements
		

			literally takes about five seconds. So everything else around it is actually a Sunday or Monday job
or recommended like walima, etc. So how does the Nicca take place takes place. The basic
requirements for a valid marriage in Islam are the following. You have two statements a statement of
offer in Arabic we termed that as a job.
		

			And you have a statement of Abul
		

			acceptance. So the statement is a statement of offer is basically, for example, a woman saying I
have given myself to you in marriage. That's a statement of offer. And the corresponding statement
is called the statement of Obul. Acceptance, the man says, I have accepted you in my marriage. So
there's these two statements. I'm not saying people right now, two statements, the statement of
offer a job and the statement of COBOL acceptance. Both of these two statements take place,
physically in a session gathering in the presence of two male witnesses, Muslim male witnesses, or
one male and two female witnesses.
		

			So, the offer and acceptance physically in a gathering in the presence of two witnesses. Now, the
reason why I said the two statements are not two people because this E job and abou list these
statements of offer an acceptance can be carried out by the two people who are marrying themselves
or someone else on the behalf. So the offer a job from the female herself, or her Willie guardian,
or a will keep someone who she appointed as an agent to pronounce that offer on her behalf.
		

			And acceptance, which will be from the male.
		

			It could be male or female. Anyone could make any of the two statements so the statement of offer
could be male, female, and the statement of Babu could be male female. But let's say in the
scenario, which normally takes place that the statement of offer is from the female, so it could be
the female herself, or her representative or her guardian and the statement of
		

			acceptance abou could be from the, you know, the groom, the man, the male who's marrying himself, or
it could be his agent or his family or someone on his behalf. So basically, for a marriage to be
valid, you need at least four people, four people in one gathering physically not online, you need
at least four people, the two people who are getting married, not necessarily be there. But you need
four people, at least in that room physically not on Zoom. So those four people will be the two
witnesses. So if it's two male, Muslim, male witnesses, are physically there, right. And there's two
other people who are the other two people, it could be the two people who are marrying. So you've
		

			got the bride and the groom, the man and the woman who are marrying, and the two witnesses, all four
of them sitting in this room. Okay. The female says, I have given myself to you in marriage, and the
man is saying, I have accepted you in my marriage. And the two witnesses understand and here, *
has done that's it. That's the basic requirement of marriage. As soon as that takes place, it takes
seven seconds, the two witnesses are sitting, hearing understanding, they can understand what they
are seeing clearly. And they know the two people who are getting married. And the woman says to the
man, I have given myself to in marriage, and he says, I have accepted you in my marriage, that took
		

			five seconds, and you got his valid done in five seconds. So you have those four people physically,
or, like I said, you have to have four people minimum. So you've got the two witnesses. But instead
of the two people who are marrying, being physically there, one of them is there, the man is there.
The groom is there. But the bride the female, the woman, she's not there physically, rather, her
representative, or her Wilkie or her agent, Willie will kill someone on her behalf, whom she has
given permission is that you still need four people minimum. So for example, her father, likely many
times in the masjid, what happens is that the woman, many masjid, the woman doesn't come to the
		

			marriage ceremony. Her father, uncle, her Willie, her guardian, someone on her behalf, whom she has
given clear explicit permission
		

			will be there. And he will utter the statement of offer the job on her behalf so that your mind will
ask that look, have you got permission from your daughter, from your sister from your knees, etc?
Has she given you permission to marry her off to this man who's sitting here? He says, Yes, I have
got permission, and I give her in the marriage of this man. So he's making the statement of
offerings on her behalf? How did she give him permission? Well, it doesn't have to be in person, as
long as they know each other. She could give him permission physically in person or over the phone.
Like, for example, her uncle is in London, and she phones from one city. So look, okay, can you
		

			please give you permission, you can marry me off to that man who is there in London,
		

			or she can write or email or whatever that doesn't have to be the permission doesn't have to be
given physically. And you don't have to have witnesses on that. It's good to have witnesses, it's
recommended, but it's not necessary, per se. So in that gathering, you'll have the two witnesses,
the man getting married himself.
		

			And the representative, who we call the Joaquin, if it's a representative will kill if it's the
Guardian, then we call that with Guardian Willie is there in the gallery. And sometimes, even the
man who's getting married is not there. So the bride and the groom are not physically there. Rather,
both of them have sent a volley guardian or representative, you still need four people physically in
the gathering in the room. So you've got the father of the boy and the father of the girl and the
two witnesses. So the girl's father, okay, The Guardian, The girl's father says, I give my daughter
in the marriage of your son. And the father of the boy says, I accept this marriage on behalf of my
		

			son, and I accept your daughter in the marriage of my son. I have accepted now, the boy and the girl
well one of them's in Japan and the other one is Botswana doing something else but they've been
married off by their fathers but remember of course if they've given permission, the both Founding
Fathers the Gulf on the Father, I'm too busy and somewhere Okay, please, tomorrow you can get my
marriage done. And the boy tells his father that I am too busy doing something as well how on hold
they're both not together, but they're in different parts of the world. And can you get my marriage
done tomorrow inshallah. The two fathers go physically as long as four people are there physically
		

			because is done you just need the job. So in summary, II job from one
		

			party whether it's the person marrying themselves, or someone on their behalf, and the Babu
acceptance by the other party, whether it's the person marrying themselves or someone else on their
behalf. This Aegir Kaboul is audible. It's loud. It's done physically, in the presence of two Muslim
male witnesses, or one male and two female witnesses. And when that happens, the Nica is considered
to be valid. And
		

			now, everything else besides that you don't really need an imam. I mean, it's good to have an imam.
But Islamically an imam is not necessarily because Islam doesn't consider marriage to be like,
you're gonna get blessed. This is not baptism or anything like that. I mean, it's good to have any
Imam so that at least they know some rules about marriage and they have knowledge about Islam, and
they might give some mercy hamdulillah but if you've learned about marriage yourself, then you don't
really need an imam. What the imam is reading is a hot buy. It's called the hot button. Hajah. It's
called a sermon of the messenger Salallahu Alaihe Salam recited, which is sunnah. So the Imam would
		

			recite that So if, for example, out of the four people, you bring a fifth person who's an Imam,
fine, but even if you don't, any one of the four people could just recite the hotbar. So the father
of the girl could just say, You know what, Okay, you go ahead, okay, I'll go ahead and he recited
the hotbar. Anyone could recite the hotbar, the father of the boy could just recite the hotbar. The
sermon for Baraka purposes in which the messenger sallallahu alayhi. wasallam, recited the three
verses of God consciousness to remind people at the time of marriage to fear Allah subhanaw taala.
They recited their chutzpah as a form of Baraka blessings and that sunnah. And then these two
		

			statements, the statement of offer the statement of Kabul, Egypt, Kabul were uttered, the two
witnesses heard remember, the two and witnesses need to clearly they need to be first of all Muslim
and they need to be either two males or one male and two females and number three, they need to
clearly hear
		

			clearly hear understand the language imagine the Two Witnesses don't understand English, they only
understand Chinese and these guys are making the offer and acceptance in English marriage is not
valid. So they need to understand and they need to understand that a marriage is taking place, you
know, they know that okay, this is a marriage and these two people are getting married and they can
clearly hear. So if that takes place, and marriage is valid. So this shows that you know this online
and zoom and this kind of marriage is not valid Islamically it will not be considered to be a
marriage. So we have an easy option look, you know, marriage over the phone or if you want to get
		

			married to somebody who is in another country. So say for example, that the sister the girl is in
the UK, she wants to marry someone who's in America now rather than go online on Zoom and he's
sitting there and says okay, you know, and the Imam isn't you know, some people do this the one the
Imam is in some are in Bahrain. Okay, some chef imam in Bahrain higher Kamala, the brother is in
America. The sister is in the UK want witnesses in South Africa and other witnesses in Indonesia?
Okay, five people on Zoom conference calling? Okay. They Mama said hamdulillah Muhammad, who was the
owner who just looked upon as an Arab Imam, mashallah, who say Okay, sister, auntie, can you please
		

			say the hijab? She says yes, I give myself to in marriage to the brother in America, the brother in
American saying, I accept you in my marriage. And the one witnesses saying well, Erica Allah, Masha,
Allah blue Pablo from South Africa. Another one, Indonesia is saying Mubarak Mubarak, and I've heard
five people in five different parts of the world that marriage Islamically is invalid. I mean, you
want to get married like that. I mean, you're not going to meet any, you know, but if you start
talking and flirting anyway over the phone that's going to be haram. And if you meet the Xena, so
these five people in different parts of the world, nobody is physically anywhere you need four
		

			people physically. Now, you might ask that how can this system then get married to that brother
who's in America, because I want to talk to him, I now want to like message him and you know, have a
intimate conversation with him before I meet him in about five months time. So it's very simple,
it's easy. What you do is you're a sister in the UK. And what you do is you just make a point an
agent in America where the brother is, you could just call a friend or a relative or someone that
you know, personally properly, they know you properly. Remember, they need to know you properly. And
the witnesses also need to know you. And you know, they don't need to know you like from your whole
		

			past history from your young age, but they need to kind of know your name and your surname and where
you live and your parents name and your father and some say even your grandfather's name. So even
though they've never talked to you, so you can just appoint somebody, an agent there. And that
person will sit with the two witnesses and with the brother physically in a room in Chicago, in
California, in Toronto, wherever in America, and Courier Danica, and then just tell you that if you
want to hear in, if you wanted we could just put that
		

			that whole session online for you on Zoom, and you could just witness it, and marriages done. You
might say, I don't know anybody who can appoint? Well, you can actually even appoint the person
you're getting married to as your agent, that's also permissible. So, you know, when I said that you
need minimum four people in a gathering, actually, it's good not to but this is like a ruling, which
I don't people shouldn't abuse, but you can technically technically get away with three people in
the gallery. So basically, your sister and you want to get married to somebody in America, you phone
him or you right, it's always good to do it in writing, right mechanize no email, I such and such,
		

			daughter have such and such grandfather's name such and such, this is my address, this is who I am,
this is my age, this is my background, write a bit about yourself, I give brother such and such His
name is such and such, etc, living in this country address etc. Give him permission to marry me off
to him. So I am making him an agent to marry me off to him, sign it, if you can have two witnesses
here, you don't necessarily need them. But if you get two witnesses to sign as well, so it's good,
but you're not, it's not necessary. And you send that email, that brother will not unzoom he will
print it out and physically take that letter, okay. And then he'll get two brothers, and he'll sit
		

			down in a gathering. Now there's three people in that room physically, he will say, explain to them,
those two witnesses will need to know him and they will need to know you, but he will explain to
them and you will give you a details on the letter anyway, they might actually talk to you on the
phone, you could actually talk to them on the phone as well and just tell them who you are. So
basically, they get an understanding of who you are, because they need to the witnesses need to know
who you are. And then that man who you're married to, will make both statements. So like one person
is doing two things. So first, he will become you like his, his, you know, making the offer on your
		

			behalf. So he will say, I'm reading out the sister who wants to marry me her statement, and she has
given me permission, she's saying that I give you permission to marry myself off to you in front of
the witnesses. This is her statement, this is his or her side. So he's made the statement of offer
on your behalf, you are the sister in the UK and then he will make his statement that I have
accepted this system in my marriage in the presence of two witnesses physically that Nikka and
marriage has done. So this is very simple, basically. So this is how a marriage takes place in
Islam. So therefore the solutions and you don't need to do it on Zoom or on font on the phone, etc,
		

			etc. Inshallah Tada. I hope this people have understood. May Allah Subhana Allah grant us an
understanding of Deen wa salam aleikum wa rahmatullah wa barakato.