Q: My husband and I have been married for 15 years, we have two children. About 7 years into our marriage i discovered that he was not being faithful and was seeing a woman. At the time I decided to carry on with our marriage dispite of this. For the sake of my children. However his affairs continued one after the other. He would apologise and I would carry on, again for the sake of our children. About two years ago I could no longer accept what he was doing and he made me feel impure. So I no longer allowed him in my bed. From that day till last night he has not mentioned or discussed why I won't let him sleep with me. Last night he told me he wanted to be with someone else and he couldn't live like this anymore. Fair enough. He said he will be looking for another partner to marry, he said he will have to talk to other women and court them to find the one he wants to marry. I said to him that this is harram as he is married to me. He can divorce me and then be with whoever he wants to be with. He then divorced me once. My question is what is divorcing once mean? Am I no longer married to him? What should I do to ensure I follow the correct rulings in regards to divourse in Islam?
A: If he had issued one talaaq, then your iddat has commenced. He has the right to revoke the talaaq and take you back during the iddat. However if he does not revoke the talaaq during the iddat period and your iddat terminates, then he will not be able to take you back in his nikah. Nevertheless if you both thereafter wish to reunite, a new nikah will have to be performed with a separate mahr.
And Allah Ta'ala (الله تعالى) knows best.
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