Polygamy was introduced for the sake of women.

The only Quranic verse that speaks about polygamy was revealed after the Battle of Uhud, which led to the death of many Muslim men who left behind families in need of support.

Islamic law allows men, unlike their female counterparts, to be wed to four spouses at a time. But, not so fast. People often forget that this is only permissible within a tight frame of conditions.

The Quran clearly states that men can marry more than one woman if and only if he treats them fairly.

فَإِنْ خِفْتُمْ أَلاَّ تَعْدِلُواْ فَوَاحِدَةً
“But if you fear that you will not be just, then [marry only] one,” Surat An-Nisaa

If we look at the example of Nabi S.A.W., we will find that there were reasons behind most of his marriages. After Khadija R.A.’s death, Nabi S.A.W. married 12 wives. One was Aisha R.A., the daughter of his closest friend and ally Abu Baker R.A. The rest were nearly all widows, divorced women, or captives. He preached consistently that it was the responsibility of men to protect those women who had met with misfortune. This was one of the reasons polygamy was encouraged. Even with female infanticide, women in seventh century Arabia far outnumbered men because so many men were killed in the inter-tribal warfare of the day. Several of Nabi S.A.W.’s wives were poor and destitute and he took them in, along with their children, into his household.

Polygamy has become so mythical in the minds of many people that they assume being Muslim means having four wives. This is a false notion, of course. A very renowned anthropologist, Edward Westermarck, in his two-volume work, “History of Human Marriage,” notes that there has been polygamy in virtually every culture and religion, including Judaism and Christianity. But the point here is not to say, “Why blame Islam?” Actually, Islam is the only religion even among Abrahamic faiths, that specifically limited the practice of polygamy that existed before Islam and established very strict conditions for guidance. The question, “How could any man have two wives? That’s terrible!” reflects ethnocentrism. We assume that because we’re living in the West and it seems strange, and we assume it must apply to all cultures, all times, under all circumstances. This simply isn’t true.

Let’s look at one current-day example. In the savage attack on Afghanistan, genocide was committed on the Afghani people. It is estimated that 1-1.5 million people lost their lives, a great majority of whom were men of a marriageable age. Now, with a great shortage of men, what will happen to their widows, their orphans and their daughters of marriageable age? Is it better to leave them in a camp, with a handout? Or better a man is willing to take care of his fallen comrade’s wife and children?
At the end of World War 2, a study on Germans in their early twenties found that for every 6 males there were 10 females. This was due to the war and the man that lost their lives. The same study found that out-of-wedlock births spiked after the war. These new mothers would have to take of their children all alone, in a post war climate with a crippled economy. The reason these new mothers are all by themselves is because there were not enough males in Germany after the war. Don’t you think polygamy would have benefitted them?