What is the ruling on a wife refusing to bear children on the grounds that she is physically exhausted?

The questioner : Regarding this... we read medically and we hear medically, meaning that after a certain age for a woman, childbirth... is a medical harm to the wife... medically; according to what is said in the magazines and newspapers that we read, so what is the ruling on having many children if the wife is physically exhausted or if it leads to her physical exhaustion?

The Shaykh : The word...

The questioner : ...the word physical exhaustion.

The Shaykh : Ah, the word "physically exhausted" is like a political word; they stretch it, they stretch it, they generalize it with you, they narrow it, they narrow it with you; so it is necessary to set limits for it. A young woman, if she becomes pregnant, finds in that, without doubt, difficulties and hardships that she does not know, whether she is pregnant or not, do you see? So what do you think if she reaches a certain age? What do you think if her health has some kind of deviation? Without doubt, the troubles will increase. The rule in this is: if it is feared that she will be harmed in herself, in her person, then at that time there is no objection to her using contraceptives, but on the condition that she does not expose herself to committing a forbidden act; such as being forced to expose her awrah (nakedness) before a female doctor, let alone a male doctor, like the IUD that is used today. If she uses some pills...

The questioner : ... .

The Shaykh : Yes, I say, so this is as it was said: "Mercy to you, some evil is less than some." As for committing a forbidden act in the way of stopping her pregnancy, and she is excused, it is not permissible for her to commit the forbidden act. Rather, she uses means like pills, and by that the matter becomes permissible, but with the previous condition; which is that it is feared for her. As for Allah, she is exhausted and her exhaustion increases, there is no doubt that the more a woman's age advances and the more fertile she is, without doubt her exhaustion will increase. But this exhaustion must be defined such that she is not afflicted with harm in her body. And this ruling is not your ruling as a husband, nor her ruling as a wife, but rather the ruling of a Muslim doctor who is sincere, who examines her thoroughly and decides the decision; at that time, it is ruled by his decision.

The questioner : As you said.

The Shaykh: Yes.

Another questioner : In some cases.

The questioner : May Allah reward you with good.

Another questioner : She has the reward and the virtue for patience in...?

The Shaykh : There is no doubt in this at all, and many of...

The questioner : Then, without doubt.

The Shaykh : Today, the reality that Muslims live in is in a non-Islamic atmosphere, meaning in most aspects, and they are influenced by Western ideas that do not align with the Islamic Shari'ah. Without doubt, the logic of the Muslim and his belief differ completely from the logic of the disbeliever—whatever type of disbelief it is—and from his belief. The disbeliever, when he marries, does not seek offspring except for entertainment, or to spend this life in dispelling loneliness and the loneliness of solitude. But the Muslim is not like that; he seeks the reward with this offspring; whether he lives or dies; because if he lives, the husband and wife will take care of his upbringing and nurture him with an Islamic upbringing, so the reward of this upbringing is written for them, and their toil around him does not go in vain. And if the child dies, especially if he dies before reaching the age of puberty and accountability, at that time the reward of the parents is multiplied, as came in the authentic hadith; which is his saying (peace and blessings be upon him): . They said: "Two, O Messenger of Allah?" He said: . The narrator said: "... We thought that if we said one, he would say and one." What is the meaning of the hadith? meaning the age of accountability. .
Without doubt, this Muslim who has three children who die, he reckons them with Allah (Blessed and Exalted is He); meaning: he seeks the reward from Allah for his patience with their deaths, so he has this great reward which, if a person lived the life of Noah (peace be upon him), its price would be cheap compared to this reward; and the Fire will not touch him except as a light touch. The Messenger (peace be upon him) refers in this hadith to His saying (Glorified and Exalted is He): .
O mankind and jinn. The exegetes differed in the interpretation of this word; in three opinions: the entering is the entry, the entering is passing through Hell on the Sirat, the entering is on the edge of the Fire. And each of the three opinions has its own specific evidence, but... it bears more than one meaning, and 'Umar ibn al-Khattab (may Allah be pleased with him) pointed to that when he said: "If the people of desires argue with you with the Qur'an, argue with them with the Sunnah; because the Qur'an is a bearer of faces." And this example is before us; . The language allows this and this and this, but two hadiths came; one is authentic in chain, and the other is weak in chain, but this weak hadith in chain testifies to that authentic hadith in chain, which is in "Sahih Muslim"; that the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him and his family) spoke one day in the presence of Hafsa bint 'Umar, the wife of the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him and his family), and he said: . Hafsa said: "How, O Messenger of Allah, when Allah says: ?" Lady Hafsa understood from the verse the entry; because she matched the negation of the Prophet (peace be upon him)... that it means the entry; so what was the position of the Prophet (peace be upon him) to remove the doubt of Hafsa (may Allah be pleased with her)? He said to her: اقرئي تمام الآية : ثُمَّ نُنَجِّي الَّذِينَ اتَّقَوْا وَنَذَرُ الظَّالِمِينَ فِيهَا جِثِيًّا Read the rest of the verse: “Then We will save those who feared Allah, and We will leave the wrongdoers therein prostrate.”. As if he (peace be upon him) is saying to her: Your understanding is a correct understanding; meaning: the entry is necessary, but an entry different from an entry, the entry of these people of the tree is not an entry of punishment, but rather an entry of passing "transit" meaning, .
Imam al-Fakhr al-Razi mentions in his tafsir "Mafatih al-Ghayb," and this is his habit, he tries to bring some of the wisdoms of some verses during his interpretation of them; he says: Among the wisdoms is the wisdom of the entry of the believers into the Fire without being affected by it, that they see their enemies who used to mock them in worldly life, then Allah (Mighty and Majestic) says in the Noble Qur'an: .

The questioner : This wisdom is sweet.

The Shaykh : Yes?

The questioner : Sweet.

The Shaykh : Sweet [The Shaykh laughs!].
This authentic hadith confirms that the meaning of the verse is as Lady Hafsa understood it, but she strayed from the complete verse, so the Messenger (peace be upon him) alerted her to it. As for the other hadith, and there is weakness in its chain, and even though al-Hakim narrated it in "al-Mustadrak" and authenticated it, he is lenient in authentication as is known, and he narrates it with his chain from Jabir ibn 'Abd Allah al-Ansari that a man met him on the road, and he related to him a discussion that took place in a gathering he attended regarding this verse, and that they differed in it on the three opinions; as if he is saying to him: So what do you have, O Jabir? Jabir ibn 'Abd Allah is from the Companions of the Messenger (peace be upon him); so what did he do? He put his two fingers in his ears and said: "May they be deaf, may they be deaf, if I had not heard the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him and his family) say: .
When we understand this reality from the meaning of this noble verse, and connect it to the previous hadith: , its meaning is that one enters the Fire by passing through it, not as a punishment. This is the benefit that the Muslim hopes for; it does not cross the mind of the disbeliever because he does not believe in Allah and His Messenger. Likewise, when the disbeliever marries, he is like the animals, seeking only to satisfy his desire, not seeking chastity beyond that, nor seeking reward; unlike the Muslim, for whom the Messenger (peace be upon him) made there be a reward in satisfying his desire. The hadith in which a group of poor people sent a messenger to the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) to complain about their condition and their poverty. They said: “O Messenger of Allah, the people of wealth have taken the rewards. They pray as we pray, they fast as we fast, they perform Hajj as we perform Hajj, and they give charity while we do not give charity?” He said (may Allah’s prayers and peace be upon him): to the end of the well-known recitation. The messenger of the poor people returned to them, may Allah have mercy on you, joyful and pleased, and brought them this good news. But it was not long before the messenger of the poor people returned to the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) to say to him: “O Messenger of Allah, the rich people have heard what you told us, so they did what we did?!” He said (peace be upon him): .
The point is: In another narration, he said: and listed many characteristics; as if he is saying to them: It is within your ability to outpace the rich people by performing these acts of worship. This is related to our discussion today. Their preoccupation with trade occupies them from enjoining good and forbidding evil, and from glorification and magnification, and so on. So you will outpace them in these things. Then he said to them: . They said: “O Messenger of Allah, does one of us come to his desire and have a reward for it?” He said: . They said: “Yes.” He said: . This meaning and this reward and virtue are not something those disbelievers think about. And therefore, one of them is content to live with his wife and have from her a child or two, a boy and a girl, and so on. And as I say on this occasion: And the fifth of them is their dog! Two children and a dog, that is their life; because they do not think about the Hereafter at all.
As for the Muslim, his thinking, his logic, and his mind are completely different. Therefore, it is expected of the Muslim to consider that if his wife is fertile, he should consider himself wealthy. And so we see many people afflicted with infertility; you find the husband going to the doctor and the wife, and so on, wanting a child. And, O Glory be to Allah! You find other people to whom Allah grants children, and what do they want? To have an abortion! Why? By Allah, the wife can no longer bear it, and by Allah, you find hardship! My brother, what is the proverb for this occasion? That is the Syrian proverb: “The one who wants to play with the cat must find its scratches.” The one who wants to obtain the reward and the recompense must obtain hardship, as the Messenger (peace be upon him) said to Aisha (may Allah be pleased with her) when she menstruated during the Farewell Pilgrimage with the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him). She was, like all the wives of the Messenger (peace be upon him), in the state of tamattu’; meaning: she had intended the lesser pilgrimage before the major pilgrimage. But when she descended with the Prophet (peace be upon him) in a place called “Saraf,” near Makkah, the Messenger (peace be upon him) came to her and found her crying. He knew (peace be upon him) and said to her: - meaning: has menstruation come to you? - She said: “Yes, O Messenger of Allah.” He said: . So she did what the pilgrim does, and completed all the rites, and she became pure at Arafat, and completed the rites, and performed the Tawaf of Ifadah, and even the Tawaf of Farewell. And the Messenger (peace be upon him) announced the return to Madinah. He came to her and found her crying. He said to her: . She said: “What is wrong with me? The people return with Hajj and Umrah, and I return with Hajj without Umrah?!” He said to her: - here is the point - . And he said to her brother, Abd al-Rahman: “Let her ride behind you, and take her to al-Tan’im, and let her enter the state of ihram from there, and enter as one in ihram, and perform the Umrah that, what? She missed. Yes, she undertook a new distance, so he said to her, as you heard, that the reward is according to the hardship.”
So the mother who is fertile is a blessing from Allah (Mighty and Majestic) for the couple, so they must be patient and bear the effects of pregnancy and the hardship of raising and providing, and so on, as much as they are able to do so. This is the logic of the Muslim. But Muslims today imitate the Europeans even in their logic, and consequently the effects and results differ; the results become non-Islamic, and the upbringing becomes non-Islamic.