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Marriage with a woman who is pregnant from Zina

Question

i did vey bad thing i had sex with agirl and she slept with another in same week then she get pegnant ,then i married her after 5 month,(before ihad sex with her i asked her if she want to marry me ,i knew that it was playing with religion )now i dont know if the baby is mine or not and i dont know what to do its the biggest mistake in my life plus she is asking for much money by the court should i pay ? and if i didnt pay god ll ask me for that cause start to be much depts for the government please help what i should do please help as fast as u can i divorced with her now after much problems thank u and please answer me

Answer

All perfect praise be to Allaah, The Lord of the Worlds. I testify that there is none worthy of worship except Allaah, and that Muhammad  sallallaahu  `alayhi  wa  sallam ( may  Allaah exalt his mention ) is His slave and Messenger.

Zina (fornication or adultery) is one of the grave major sins and you are obliged to sincerely repent to Allaah from committing this abominable sin; for more benefit on the conditions of repentance, please refer to Fataawa 86527 and 87903.

We also advise you to avoid any means that may lead you to commit Zina again.

As regards your marriage to this girl, then according to the view of the scholars  may  Allaah  have  mercy  upon  them it is not permissible to marry a woman who committed Zina except with two conditions: she should sincerely repent and she should make sure that she is not pregnant. Therefore, your marriage to her is void. However, in marriages where there is a difference of opinion over its invalidity, the woman deserves the dowry that is mentioned to her, and if you did not mention to her any dowry, then she deserves the dowry of the women of the same social status like her, and you are not obliged to pay anything more than this. Nevertheless, you should try every means in order to avoid paying the extra money which they demand.

With regard to the child, if that woman gave birth to him less than six months from the date of marriage, then he is not religiously traced back to you because the minimum period of pregnancy is sixth months. However, if she gave birth to him six months or more than six months after marriage, then he is traced back to you, and he is considered as your son because the Prophet  sallallaahu  `alayhi  wa  sallam ( may  Allaah exalt his mention ) said: "The child is for the owner of the bed and the stone is for the person who commits an illegal sexual intercourse (i.e. the child will not be traced back to him)." [Al-Bukhari and Muslim]

Finally, it should be noted that the child is traced back to the father in controversial marriages; for more benefit, please refer to Fataawa 89082, 84301 and 86405.

Allaah Knows best.

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