What is the ruling on plural marriage?

Question : What is the default in marriage: is it plural marriage or marrying one woman? I have three children, I live in an Islamic country, and I desire plural marriage. My wife does not want that, and she threatens me with many things. So what is your advice to me and to a wife like mine?

Answer : I say: May Allah make it easy for young men to have a single marriage without plural marriage. Now, women are sitting in their homes and young men are idle. There are reasons for this, including the high cost of mahr (bridal gifts). A father imposes a large mahr on the suitor. Some of them told me that he said, "I will not accept from you less than one hundred thousand riyals. The blood money for a man is one hundred thousand riyals." Perhaps a man who owns livestock will say, "And a water tank for the livestock, to draw water for the livestock." And so on. This is not permissible, O our brothers. Women are not sheep to be sold. If there comes to you one whose religion and character you are pleased with, then what?
Marry her. But if a person has been enriched by Allah with wealth and is capable of justice, and has the ability to give the woman her specific right, then here I say plural marriage is better. Plural marriage is better, so that a man may take one, two, how many?
Three? Four. That is enough. So plural marriage is better. First, because it fulfills the need of idle women, and females among the children of Adam are more numerous than males. Second, because it increases the children, the children of the Muslim community, the men of the Muslim community.
And this is a source of pride for Muslims. It is also something the Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him) loved, where he said: "Marry the fertile, the fertile." And our enemies among the disbelievers and their like say: "Do not have plural marriage. How can you have multiple wives?"
"Do not increase the offspring. Regulate the population," and similar matters by which they have deceived many people. The strange thing is that these disbelievers deny to us plural marriage of wives by the lawful, while they have multiple prostitutes by the unlawful. How many does one have of his companion? Allah knows best. In any case, this is what they criticize Islam and Muslims for: the prevalence of plural marriage. And the truth is the prevalence of women. And the truth is that this is what conforms to evidence and reason: plural marriage with these three conditions. Say it, O my brother. Yes. Yes. One important thing remains.
Justice, complete. You did well. For this reason, Allah the Exalted said: If a person fears that he will not be just, it is not permissible for him to have plural marriage. And I do not want to use this verse as evidence for plural marriage, because it does not point to plural marriage. But it points to the fact that if you fear that you will not deal justly with orphans, the door is open before you: marry one, two, three, or four. But the texts, from other angles, indicated that plural marriage with the three conditions is preferable.