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Is a husband entitled to forcibly recover the mahr, or to compel his wife to return to him after he has declared his desire for a divorce, and she has refused to return to him, and her 'iddah has expired?

1 min readAlso available in العربية

If a man secludes himself with his wife in a legally valid seclusion (khalwah shar'iyah mu'tabarah), she is entitled to the full mahr (dower), and she must observe the 'iddah (waiting period). He also has the right to take her back before the expiration of her 'iddah. However, if there was no valid seclusion or intercourse, then the divorce is an irreversible divorce (طلاق بائن - talaq ba'in), and she is not required to observe an 'iddah, as Allah Almighty says: "O you who have believed, when you marry believing women and then divorce them before you have touched them, then there is no 'iddah [period] for you to count concerning them." In this case, the wife is entitled to half of the stipulated mahr, as Allah Almighty says: "And if you divorce them before you have touched them but you have already specified for them an obligation [of mahr] - then [give them] half of what you specified, unless they [the women] forgo it or he in whose hand is the marriage contract [the husband] forgives it. And to forgo it is closer to righteousness. And do not forget graciousness between you."

Summarized from the full answer at Ftawy · reviewed Sep 2, 2026

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