lineage, not language. A person may be Arab yet know only a non-Arabic language. Thus, if an Arab woman—that is, one Arab in origin and lineage, regardless of the language she speaks—is married to a non-Arab man, the marriage is valid, because Arab lineage is not a condition for its validity. This includes non-Arab Persians, such as Iranians and those like them; and Western non-Arabs, such as the English, French, Americans, and Russians. Everyone other than the Arabs is non-Arab.
His statement, “then whoever among the woman or her guardians is not content has the right to annulment”: as for the woman, it is known—as mentioned previously—that her consent is a condition; if she does not consent, she is not to be married off. But the guardians, even distant ones, have the right to annul the marriage. That is, if a man belonging to a tribe marries his daughter, with her consent, to a man who does not belong to a tribe, while the man is religious, God-fearing, of good character and means, and among the best of people, then a distant cousin may come and say, “I am not content with this,” and according to the madhhab he has the right to annul the marriage—even one who is subsequently born.
Thus, a tribal woman may marry a non-tribal man and remain with him for fifty years, bearing him children. Then a child may be born to one of her distant cousins; when he grows up, he says, “I do not accept this. Annul the marriage,” and the marriage is annulled, even though she has children and a household. The household and everything else are ruined because of a cousin who may simply be envious and does not care about the honour of lineage!
The apparent meaning of the author’s words is that even her sons may annul it, since they are guardians. The correct view, however, is that no one has the right to annul a marriage so long as it is valid. We say to those who maintain that it is valid and then say that annulment is permissible: if the contract is valid according to the evidence of the Sacred Law, how can anyone annul it without evidence from the Sacred Law? And no