A study of the occurrence of divorce in the biography of the imams (peace on them)‎

Abstract EN

The constructive biography of the Imams in facing with the issue of divorce is an illuminating pattern in family life.

Ahlebait criticized divorce in general in various narrations.

Yet, there are some narrations in which the five divorce cases of the Imams: Sajjad, Bagher, Kazem, and Imam Reza were spoken of.

Hence, one of the major aims of this study is to investigate these narrations.

The research findings confirm that in the narration regarding Imam Reza's pronouncing the divorce formula for his martyred father and his wife, the case is quite specific.

Regarding the three aforementioned other Imams, those divorces actually came into reality since Imam Sajjad and Imam Bagher's spouses were infidels in beliefs and Imam Kazem's spouse was a very mal-behaving individual.

As those Imams' leads might be practiced as patterns by some societies, what they actually showed through their biography in practice were: (1) the rejection of the illusion that divorce was forbidden; (2) corrupt beliefs break the matrimonial ties; and (3) the logical correct borderline between 'maximal tolerance in matrimonial life' and 'divorce' seems to be the point up to which the continuation of the matrimonial life does not result in Osr and Haraj [severe difficulty and embarrassment].

Key words: divorce, the Imams' biographies, narrations with stipulated causes, narrations without stipulated causes.