for binding her to a marriage to which she did not consent.

The assertion that “the dowry is not an objective of marriage” has no substance. It is an integral part of marriage, and stipulating it carries greater force than stipulating the price in a sale, because the Prophet said:

“The conditions most deserving of fulfillment are those by which you have made marital intimacy lawful.”

Property may lawfully be acquired in exchange for compensation, whereas marital intimacy becomes lawful only through dowries. A marriage may be contracted without specifying and fixing the dowry, but not with an express exclusion of it. A marriage contracted without further specification entails the customary dowry for a woman of her standing. Likewise, according to the correct view—which is one of the two positions reported from Ahmad—a sale may be concluded at the going price. There is therefore no difference, as has been explained at length elsewhere.

What is established by the Book, the Sunnah, and scholarly consensus is that marriage may be contracted without specifying the dowry—that is, without determining its amount—not that it may be contracted with an express exclusion of it. Indeed, Allah Most High said:

“We certainly know what We have prescribed for them concerning their wives and those whom their right hands possess.”

When He permitted the Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, to marry without a dowry, He required the others not to marry without one. The Quran likewise indicates this in more than one passage. There must therefore be a dowry, whether expressly specified and fixed or left unspecified. If it is subsequently fixed, it is whatever the two agree upon; otherwise, she is entitled to the customary dowry of women comparable to her, as the Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, ruled in the case of Birwa‘ bint Wāshiq.

How different the two cases are! People regularly marry without specifying a dowry, having mutually accepted the dowry customary in such circumstances, namely, the customary dowry for a woman of her standing. Likewise, they regularly buy and sell, having mutually accepted the price the seller charges at