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What is the wisdom behind Islam limiting the number of wives to four, and not more or less?

1 min readAlso available in العربية

As Muslims, we believe that Allah's rulings are never devoid of wisdom. Although some wisdom may be hidden from us, there is no harm in asking about it to increase certainty. Allah has legislated for a man to marry up to four women for a wise reason. The detrimental effects of not having polygyny have become clearly apparent in our time, with a large number of unmarried women, leading to great corruption. We should not emulate the disbelievers in debating the wisdom of legislation, which may not be fully grasped in every ruling. Instead, the focus should be on believing in Allah and submitting to His decrees, and on clarifying the truth of Islam and the falsehoods in their religion.

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

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