(NB: All names have been changed to protect the identity of the people mentioned.)
NINETEEN year old Ahmed, an American of Pakistani lineage shocked his parents by announcing that he was planning on marrying 23-year-old Abeer, an American-Jordanian. But more importantly, a girl he had never seen, and met only on the Internet!
Ahmed then travelled from the US to the Jordanian capital Amman, to meet Abeer and her father. Sometime later, Ahmed’s parents, both still in the US, received a message on their answering machine that their son had gotten married in a mosque.
Today, Ahmed, who has yet to finish school and has a part-time job, and his purdah observing wife, Abeer, live with his parents.
Ahmed is not the first one to tie the knot so young. In fact he is the third one in his group of young Muslim boys who married within the last one year. Abdullah, an American-Muslim convert is a high school graduate. He married a young Pakistani girl who is about to finish high school. Nineteen-year-old Mohammad, another convert, married a 17-year-old Mexican who he met online in an Islamic chat room. She became a Muslim, much against her family’s wishes and moved to the US. She is, as she says, “happily married and learning Islam from her newly wed husband”. She observes strict purdah and is completely covered from head to toe.
Ahmed and his friends are among a growing group of young Muslim men who believe in getting married young. These men are very religious and find it frustrating to live in America in an open lifestyle. Their peers are openly or secretly dating. They go to the movies, to the beaches, to discotheques and have a good time. However, young Muslim men like Ahmed don’t even watch television or listen to music. They socialize only among themselves, meeting in mosques and halaqas.
They also frequent Islamic chat rooms on the Internet. That is how Mohammad and Ahmed found their wives. The Islamic chat rooms are there supposedly for matrimonial purposes only. These men soon get hitched with women who share their ideas. Within months, photos are exchanged and then they get married, many times meeting each other for the first time during the marriage ceremony. Most of these marriages take place against the parents’ wishes.
“You don’t know how hard it is to be surrounded by ill-clad women especially in summer time. We are young men and not hypocrites. Islam encourages young men to marry, it saves us from sinning”, Abdullah told me. “That is why all of us got married and it’s a decision we do not regret.”
Abdullah, found his wife not through the Internet, because he is too devout to chat with women on the Net. He spread the word that he was wanting to marry. At the same time, in an Islamic conference there was a very religious family looking for a husband for their young sixteen-year-old daughter who also wears the niqab. A go-between arranged the marriage. The nikah was performed but the marriage was delayed till the girl turned eighteen and graduated from high school.
All the married young men do odd jobs. Some are even going to school part-time while others are toying with the idea. They make very little money but have no complaints. “Our needs are limited. We are not materialistic”, Abdullah said.
“We don’t watch television or movies. We do not go to concerts or eat out. We do not believe in fancy furniture or designer clothes. We buy cheap second hand cars and live very simply. If you follow Islam, you don’t need too much money.” he concludes
But not everyone agrees with them.
“They are young people with no idea of what life entails. They are living in Utopia and will find out soon that it doesn’t exist”, Ahmed’s Pakistani-naturalized American mother told me.
“I was not happy that my son got married so young and the way he did. I would have preferred that he at least finished his schooling. But he told me that it was best for him. I console myself by thinking that in the United States most teenagers have a relationship. Either they are living with someone or dating someone. At least my son got married and the girl he chose is a practising Muslim and very sweet. I have grown to like her a lot. I have a full time job and she helps me around the house which works wonders for me.
“But I still think marriage is something very serious and my son is still very immature. The Internet and its chat rooms have become a playground where young people with no experience or idea of the seriousness of life, meet and make important decisions like marriage based on a few chat sessions. I think some Muslim man of knowledge, maybe from Al-Azhar University, should look at this dangerous, growing trend of young Muslim and give some kind of counselling or opinion on the matter.
Young men should be encouraged to finish their education before they get married. They should be asked to listen to their parents about such matters. In the end it’s the parents who end up supporting everyone. God knows what will happen if they start having children. They are not mature enough to take care of their own needs. If you bring up some of the problems, these men only have one answer, `Allah knows best. He will provide.” Nobody is debating that, but even the Prophet Mohammad (Peace Be Upon him) was 25 when he first married,’ concluded Ahmed’s very concerned mother.
But isn’t it un-Islamic to chat with women online? “No, not if your intention is to get married and find the right girl.” Ahmed said rather aggressively.
“My mother tried to find a girl for me, but no one would have me. They said, I was too young and too uneducated. So I found Abeer all by myself in an Islamic chat room. I did not even see her till a few days before my nikah and am happily married too.”
(NB: All names have been changed to protect the identity of the people mentioned.)
