Rights and Duties of Spouses
Marriage & spousehood · Marriage & spousehood · Garments for one another
The Qurʾān's governing image for marriage is mutual covering — each spouse a garment for the other — and its governing standard is maʿrūf: honourable, recognised kindness in everyday dealings.
At a glance
| Key image | “They are a garment for you and you are a garment for them” (Qurʾān 2:187) |
|---|---|
| Standard | “Live with them honourably” — muʿāshara bi-l-maʿrūf (4:19) |
| Reciprocity | “They have rights like those over them, in fairness” (2:228) |
| Prophetic model | “The best of you are the best to their families” (Tirmidhī) |
"They are a garment for you and you are a garment for them" (2:187): the metaphor carries closeness, adornment, warmth and the covering of one another's faults, and commentators across the traditions have treated it as the Qurʾān's most complete statement of what spouses are to each other. Its legal counterpart is the repeated command of muʿāshara bi-l-maʿrūf — "live with them honourably" (4:19) — which jurists made the measuring rod of marital conduct: maintenance, speech, intimacy and patience are all judged against what fairness and known good custom require.
The Qurʾān states the reciprocity plainly: "they have rights similar to those over them, in fairness" (2:228). Classical law distributed the duties asymmetrically — the husband owes mahr and full maintenance (nafaqa) regardless of his wife's own wealth; the wife's property remains entirely her own — while the moral tradition pressed both spouses toward service and gentleness. The Prophet's own household is the tradition's exemplar: he mended his garments, served his family, and said "the best of you are the best to their families, and I am the best of you to my family" (Tirmidhī). His marriage to Khadīja — his counsellor, his first believer, his comfort in crisis — is remembered as the model of partnership; ʿĀʾisha's narrations preserve the domestic detail.
Much of what modern writers call the invisible work of a household — anticipating needs, keeping the ties of two extended families, the daily unnoticed labour — the tradition addresses through the ethic of iḥsān (excellence beyond obligation) and the Prophet's insistence that acts of service within the home are charity. The juristic minimum is deliberately a floor, not a ceiling; the tradition's praise is reserved for those who exceed it.
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Curated reference on Islamic belief and thought. On matters where traditions differ, positions are attributed rather than adjudicated; verify points of doctrine with qualified scholars.