Marriage Between Muslim Men and Non Muslim Women

The dominant view of the Zaydī school is that marriage between a Muslim man and a Kitābī woman is prohibited.

Those who have permitted it have relied on the following verse:

“The chaste believing women and the chaste women of the people who were given the Book before you, are lawful to you, provided that you give them their dowers, and marry them, neither committing fornication nor taking them as mistresses..” — (Surat al-Māʾida 5:5).

However, Abū al-ʿAbbās al-Ḥasanī (d. 353 AH) narrated in his Sharḥ al-Aḥkām with a complete chain of narrators to Imam Muḥammad al-Bāqir (d. 114 AH) that the aforementioned verse was revealed when the number of Muslim women was few. As a result, Allah allowed believing men to marry Kitābī women.

This was later abrogated when the numbers of Muslim women increased, by the verse:

“Do not marry the idolatresses until they believe…” — (Surat al-Baqara 2:221).

Abū al-ʿAbbās al-Ḥasanī further relates that Imam Muḥammad b. ʿAbdullah Nafs al-Zakiyya (d. 145 AH) concurred and said that it was also abrogated by the verse:

“Hold not to the marriage bonds with disbelievers” — (Surat al-Mumtaḥana 60:10).

Reference

📕 — Sharḥ al-Aḥkām, Abū al-ʿAbbās al-Ḥasanī (d. 353 AH).