Children born from adultery are usually affiliated to their mothers and not her partner. Although another view permits its affiliation to the father if he has been given the mandatory punishment for adultery.

The Family Line of Illegitimate Children

Similar Questions

• Children born in adultery.

The Issue

In non-Muslim countries, many children are born outside of wedlock. A man may take a mistress with no marriage arranged between them and she may give birth to one or more children. To whom should such children be affiliated, and from whom do they inherit?

Ruling

The first view: An illegitimate child is affiliated to its mother and she inherits from the child if it dies. The majority of scholars are of the view that such a child cannot be affiliated to the adulterer who consorted with its mother.

The Assembly of Muslim Jurists of America

The Assembly confirms that maintaining correct family lineage is an important aim of Islamic jurisprudence and adultery does not confirm any legitimate lineage. However, a man may affiliate to himself a child of unknown family if he does not acknowledge that the child is born through adultery, and it could be his own child, provided that the child does not deny this if it is old enough to know.

The Permanent Committee for Research and Fatwa said in one fatwa: ‘The right view expressed by scholars is that a child cannot be affiliated to the man who had intercourse with its mother unless this was based on a valid or invalid marriage, or on a suspect marriage [...]. In these cases, the child’s family lineage with this man is correct and they inherit from each other. If the intercourse was one of adultery, the child cannot be affiliated to the adulterer. As such it does not inherit from him.’

In another fatwa the Committee said: ‘An illegitimate child is affiliated to its mother. Its status is the same as all Muslims if its mother is a Muslim. It is not blamed or shamed for its mother’s sin, or for the sin of the one who was her partner in adultery. These rulings confirm that wrong traditions are of no importance,

The second view: It is permissible to affiliate an illegitimate child to the man who committed adultery with the child’s mother, if he has been given the mandatory punishment for adultery.

Sources

•  The Assembly of Muslim Jurists of America.
•  Fatawa by the Permanent Committee for Research and Fatwa.  
• The Kuwait Fiqh Encyclopaedia.