Rethinking Mahr: Rashid Rida’s Tafsir and Its Implications for Islamic Family Law

Abstract

This article examines Rashid Rida’s ethical-legal reasoning on mahr in Tafsir al-Manar, asking how his exegesis positions mahr as a woman’s financial right rather than a purely symbolic marital gift. The study responds to a persistent gap in scholarship: discussions of mahr frequently remain at the level of doctrinal fiqh or social custom, while the internal logic of modernist tafsir especially the way it connects Qur’anic language to normative claims about economic protection and marital justice has not been mapped systematically. The research uses qualitative library methods and thematic content analysis. Primary data consist of Rida’s relevant interpretive passages in Tafsir al-Manar on Qur’anic discourse related to mahr and its legal-ethical implications. The analysis proceeds through (1) coding recurrent arguments, (2) grouping them into ethical-legal principles (justice, property protection, responsibility, and harm-prevention), and (3) interpreting their coherence through a maqāsid-based analytical lens to clarify the purposive structure of the reasoning. The findings show that Rida frames mahr as an enforceable financial entitlement anchored in fairness and the safeguarding of women’s economic interests. His reasoning emphasizes constraints against coercion and inequitable bargaining, including in post-marital situations, and treats mahr as a normative safeguard rather than a discretionary token. A maqāsid-based reading illuminates how these principles function as purposive legal-ethical safeguards, enabling a rights-sensitive account of marital finance grounded in Qur’anic interpretation.