Adonis Diaries

Temporary marriage contracts: Sigheh and city of Mashhad (Iran)

The author of “Walk on my eyes; welcome” wrote:

“I interviewed Samaneh, a 52 year-old woman theologian teaching in the Iranian city of Mashhad.  All the main streets in Mashhad converge to the mausoleum of Imam Rida.

The Moslem Shias sect believe that Caliph Al Maamoun assassinated Rida by poisoning around 850 AC.  Mashhad receives 20 million pilgrims (visitors of Holy places) every year (twice greater than pilgrims heading to Mecca).  Actually, most pilgrims to Mashhad combine sincere prayers with sexual pleasures:  Mashhad is renown to be the city where prostitutes flock to in Iran.  Those who can afford it contract out temporary marriage or sigheh for the duration.

I asked Samaneh: “How can you reconcile this liberty of sexual conditions in Mashhad and the observed requirements in the Koran?”  Samaneh replied:

“Islam seeks happiness for its believers.  The sigheh is a real marriage with a contract defining the conditions and amount of money paid to the wife for a duration.  In the sigheh, the man and the woman are officially married.  This contract satisfies the basic needs for feeling happy, complete, and finding peace of mind until permanent marriages are feasible.”

Samaneh resumed: “Sigheh existed during the Prophet Muhammad’s period until the second caliph Omar banned this tradition.  Caliph Ali re-instituted the sigheh contract saying: “When wives are sick or when the husbands cannot wait longer than 5 years for sexual satisfaction then sigheh is better than committing sin.”

Samaneh continued: “In general, it is the divorced women and those who lost their husbands who ask for sigheh because it is not easy to remarry permanently after the first marriage.  Virgin girls have to get the permission from the father, grandfather, or one of the brothers.”

I asked Samaneh: “Iranian Nobel laureate Shirin Abadi is demanding equal parts in inheritance because it is not fair that boys get twice the girls.”  Samaneh replied:

“Shirin has her ideas.  Personally I agree to equal shares:  Women have demonstrated to be better money managers than men.”

I asked Samaneh: “Shirin demands that the courts should accept a woman testimony as valid as man (the custom in Iran is that testimonies of two women equal one man’s testimony; In Saudi Arabia, women are not allowed to testify, period)”

Samaneh answered: “I once visited a prison and the men convicts cried sincerely telling me their stories as innocent men.  I believed that they were innocent until the ward showed me their documents.  Consequently, women are too emotional to testifying rationally in serious situations.”

I am currently reading “Three cups of tea” and the author mentioned that a Pakistani/Balti entrepreneur in Baltistan province (North Pakistan), who supplies European alpinists (mountain climbers), contract out several sigheh “zawaj Mout3a” each season with the foreign girls.

Note 1:  Sigheh is catching up in Sunni Moslem States thanks to the Saudis.  Egypt has been agreeing to contracting out temporary marriage since the establishment of the Saudi Kingdom:  The Saudi princes and the middle class in Saudi Arabia have increased their touristic trips to Egypt for easy, affordable, and lenient sexual pleasures.

The Saudi middle class cannot afford to marry 4 wives because they cannot afford equitable conditions for all wives. Thus, they seek new adventures out of borders, preferably with virgin child girls.  The Saudi royal family members prefer young boys when they travel for a change of 4 wives.

Syria is catching up on sigheh contracts since Iranians and Saudis are touring Syria more frequently than before.

Note 2:  The abridged interview and accounts are translated from the French book “Walk on my eyes; welcome” by Serge Michel and Paolo Woods.

Note 3: Are you aware of the legalized religious prostitution of one-hour sigheh contracts? https://adonis49.wordpress.com/2013/09/02/one-hour-sigheh-contract-pleasure-marriage-widely-applied-in-iran-on-underage-slave-girls/