The Muslim no-strings-attached "misyar" marriage often done in secret is fast pervading Saudi society -- a boon for cash-strapped men unable to afford expensive traditional weddings, but deplored by critics for legitimising promiscuity. The practice, usually a temporary alliance in which the wife waives some conventional marriage rights such as cohabitation and financial support, has been legally permitted in the conservative Muslim kingdom for decades.
More than a dozen interviews with matchmakers and misyar couples -- including grooms juggling other conventional marriages -- offer a window into a phenomenon still shrouded in secrecy and shame, despite its proliferation. The testimonies highlight how misyar is seen as a hybrid between marriage and singlehood, benefiting polygamists without the stress of maintaining a second household.
Despite its potential for abuse, it also appeals to some women keen to shun patriarchal expectations of traditional marriages, as well as unmarried couples seeking religious cover for sexual relationships, forbidden by Islam outside wedlock. He told AFP he had three children from a separate, conventional marriage, and visits his misyar wife in her Riyadh home "whenever" he wants. He did not say what she gained from the secret alliance.
He divorces and marries another, divorces and marries another Saudis, as well as the kingdom's expat workers, can be seen hunting on dating apps and matrimonial websites for such partners. He began searching after sending his wife and five-year-old son back to Cairo at the start of the coronavirus pandemic last year, mainly due to rising living costs and an expat levy introduced by Saudi Arabia in recent years.
Such marriages are often short-lived, with most ending in divorce from anywhere between 14 and 60 days, the kingdom's Al-Watan newspaper reported in , citing justice ministry sources. It is touted by some women as a fleeting escape from spinsterhood or a chance for a fresh beginning for divorcees and widows, who otherwise struggle to remarry. A close associate of a divorced Syrian woman in Riyadh told AFP she was in a secret misyar relationship because she feared her ex-husband, a Saudi, would legally seek custody of her two children if he discovered that she had remarried.
