MARRIAGE: A MEDIUM OF REACHING ALLAH
We have already described that one of the important factors in making spiritual progress is having a well-bred and suitable spouse.
Young brother and sister, do you desire to start upon a spiritual journey and reach a place where Allah stamps your heart with His approval and pleasure, when you are still young and your heart is pure and the dust of abjectness and sin has not yet contaminated your soul?
By the grace of Allah, move on! But do not move alone, this is a risky and dangerous way. You need a companion, a helper, a sympathiser. Take the hand of another young one as your life partner and set off together, so that you may be the helper, sympathiser, associate and confidante to each other. You may make each other hopeful and encourage one another.
Think of what the Prophet (a.s) said:
من أحب أن يلقي الله طاهرا مطهرا فليلقه متزوجا
"Whoever disires to meet Allah in a pure condition must marry (take a spouse)." 1
So now that you have the love, enthusiasm and joy of the youth, move and select your partner for the life journey, Now is the time to commence a journey. Do not allow this love, enthusiasm and joy change into sadness, apathy and frigidity.
The marriage that rest upon fresh love and felicity makes the coming years of life fragrant, pleasant and colourful. Take the hand of your young, vivacous life partner and fly over the heights of the sky like two loving pigeons. Make good of this duration. Do not let it go.
See what Ali (a.s) says about his wife Fatima (s.a) and how he recited verses of love, defining the duration of youth.
"We were enjoying felicity, health and youth like two pigeons in a dwelling."
These two spouses lived a pure prosperous life full of
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1- Bihourly An war, vol. 103,p 220.
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love, and met Allah in a pure condition full of love.
Allah's salutation to them.
THE TIME OF SEXUAL AND MENTAL MATURITY
In spite of the fact that it has been explained that a person's correct time of marriage can be visualized from his interior and that the time of marriage is when a person attains sexual and mental maturity, yet this same question keeps on being discussed by the elders, parents, guardians, and those responsible for society, and even by the youth themselves: 'After all, when is the proper time and age of marriage, and when do sexual and mental meturity reach their climax and zenith?"
The response is that lands, circumstances, societies, races, tribes, families, and individulas are not homogenous and harmonious in this field; instead they are different. For example, in hot areas, sexual maturity is attained earlier than in cold ones. And in open and mixed up societies, where men and women have more chance to meet and get in touch, and where the religious ordains and commandments and the matters pertaining to veil, Islamic Hijab and intimate and non-intimate relationships are not observed, sexual puberty is attained at an early stage. On the contrary, in the peripheries and environments where people adhere and are committed to religion, modesty and commandments of religion it is not so. In the families which are uncultured and untrained and where sexual matters are not under security or privacy, children having become aware of the sexual matters of the fathers and mothers become sexually mature sooner, as in contrast to families where these things are secured and under restricted conditions. (Sometimes even the children go astray by observing sexual matters between their parents). At the same time, the quality and quantity of food is also effective in this regard. Those who eat more energetic food attain puberty faster.
What can be said about the non-Islamic, immodest and sexually free, disorderly countries and societies? We may metaphorically say that even their primary school children are sexually aware. And the statistics and news make it evident that sexual assaults among children and the youth have become so customary and ordinary that it has blackened the face of humanity.
Nevertheless, it can be said that in our varous, different countries and societies the average sexual puberty of boys is 17 and among girls, it is 14 (not religious puberty). But this age is early for marriage, because, as wellas sexual puberty, mental maturity is also necessary for marriage. The age of 19 years for boys and 16 years for girls is more suitable for marriage. Of course, this is an average age, and it is possible that a boy or a girl has an early need for a spouse, so an early step may be taken.
We re-emphasise that the signs of this urge are hidden inside a person and everyone can judge it for himself. If the parents are intelligent and attentive, they can understand very well when their son or daughter needs a spouse.
THE VIEW OF AN EXPERT
Sometime age, I went to see Ayatollah Ibrahim Amiri (a pious, discernible scholar conversant with family problems for many years, who has close contacts with the problems of youth). I had a talk with him on his viewpoint of the marriage age, which he has discussed in his book "The Spouse Selection."
Before narrating the detail of the discussion, I hereby exactly cite what he has written in his book:
"The nature and special creation of man has fixed the ago of marriage and thati tis the puberty age. When a boy reaches puberty at the age of 16 and a girl at 10 years, theycan marry. But it is better to delay the marriage up to 17 years and 14 or 15 years in boys and girls respectively. Because boys and girls do not have sufficient amount of mental and intellectual maturity at the beginning of puberty, and at this age might have difficutlties accompanied with it. Furthermore, in the initial two or three years after puberty, sexual instinct is not completely awakened and does not pressurise the youth too much, and its endurance is not so much difficult.
Therefore, it can be said that the most suitable marriage age for boys is 17 to 18 years and for girls 14 to 17 years. But it is not advisable to delay their marriage beyong the above mentioned ages, since it may cause negative physical, spiritual or social diseases and discrepancies. The sexual instinct, having completely and absolutely awakened, is provoked and excited and exerts pressure upon the youth. And there is no alternative left except fulfilling the desire lawfully. The sexual urge is just like the urge and need for water and food. Can you tell a hungry of thirsty person to refrain from eating ad drinking? Can another activity, evne exercise and recreaton or games, divert the attention of a hungry and thirsty one from food or water? The sexual urge too is like hunger and thirst, rather it is many times stronger and more powerful. And if it is not soothed and axhieved through lawful means, it may deviate and drag a young one towards going astray and sin, and controlling it is very difficult. And we must not remain indifferent and unmindful about the bad consequences of sexual deviation pertaining to this world and the Hereafter.
Supposedly, even if the youth could, by virtue of his faith, shame and modesty control the powerful sexual lust and does not indulge in sin, yet what would be done with its negative physical and spiritual consequences? Therefore, there is no choece but to get married at a fixed age, and one must marry as soon as possible."1
I asked him if he still held the same view and opinion about the time of marriage, even when many years had passed since the publication of his book, "Intekhabe Hamsar" (The Spouse Selection).
He replied: "yes, this is the sole way of rectification and solutionto the problem of the youth; that is, they marryt at the natural timeof marriage,and until such time as this difficulty is not removed, no other way of
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1- Intekhab-e Hamsar, p31/32 (The spouse selection).
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solving the youth problems will bear any fruit."
I said: "Do you say that, even after taking the social facts and present difficulties on the way to marriage into consideration?" He reflected. "Yes, if all these expenditures and expenses which are incurred upon subsidiary matters, all these efforts which are concentrated upon the difficulties of the youth, all the expenses relating to missionary and cultural activities and the budget which is allocated to confronting a cultural attack - if all these sources are spent upon the marriage of the youth, and this way is opened up for them, only then will the cultural attack and aggression no longer have any negative and adverse effect. Let any amount of planning be made and materialised in regard of meeting and confronting the cultural attack; all that will remain ineffective whilst the problem of youth marriage at the nartural age remains unsolved. The real and actual combat against cultural aggression is that the youth marry at the time of their sexual and mental puberty."
