The Mourning Period (Iḥdād) for Widowers: A Gender and Sociological Perspectives

Nur Fadhilah; Nihayah Nihayah; Ahmad Muhtadi Anshor; Hamadah Ashfiya

doi:10.21580/sa.v20i2.25653

Authors

Nur Fadhilah Department of Islamic Family Law, Faculty of Sharia, Universitas Islam Negeri Islam Maulana Malik Ibrahim Malang, Malang, Indonesia https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3862-7103
Nihayah Nihayah Department of Islamic Family Law, Faculty of Sharia and Law, Universitas Islam Negeri Islam Sayyid Ali Rahmatullah Tulungagung, Tulungagung, Indonesia
Ahmad Muhtadi Anshor Department of Islamic Family Law, Faculty of Sharia and Law, Universitas Islam Negeri Islam Sayyid Ali Rahmatullah Tulungagung, Tulungagung, Indonesia https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0200-0015
Hamadah Ashfiya Crosscultural and Applied Linguistics, Arts and Social Sciences Postgraduate, The University of Sydney, Sydney, Australia https://orcid.org/0009-0007-8135-7616

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.21580/sa.v20i2.25653

Keywords:

gender reciprocity, iḥdād, mubādalah, widower mourning

Abstract

Despite extensive scholarship on female mourning practices (iḥdād), male mourning within Islamic legal and gender studies is largely overlooked, creating a significant gap in understanding how widowers manage grief culturally and religiously. This study focuses on the neglected male mourning practices in Islamic contexts and how widowers navigate their grief. Through a qualitative method involving in-depth interviews with five widowers, alongside observations and document analysis (in the form of local prayer books, memorial schedules, and religious guidance texts), the data was thematically analyzed using the Braun and Clarke framework, combined with phenomenological insights to uncover emotional and ethical patterns. The findings indicate that widowers engage in ethical negotiations—such as postponing remarriage and avoiding social gatherings—that reflect an interplay between Islamic teachings and Javanese cultural norms. This research suggests that the Qira'ah Mubādalah perspective offers a valuable interpretive framework that situates these mourning practices within a context of reciprocal ethics rooted in spirituality, which has broader implications for gender ethics in contemporary Islamic discourse.

Downloads

Download data is not yet available.

References

Abdul Kodir, Faqiuddin, Nor Ismah, Samia Kotele, Wakhit Hasyim, and Fadzila Din. “Maqāṣid Cum-Mubādalah Methodology of KUPI: Centering Women’s Experiences in Islamic Law for Gender-Just Fiqh.” Al -Ihkam: Jurnal Hukum & Pranata Sosial 19, no. 2 (2025): 519–45. https://doi.org/10.19105/al-lhkam.v19i2.16617.

Bakhshizadeh, Marziyeh. “A Social Psychological Critique on Islamic Feminism.” Religions 14, no. 2 (2023): 202. https://doi.org/10.3390/rel14020202.

Braun, Virginia, and Victoria Clarke. “Using Thematic Analysis in Psychology.” Qualitative Research in Psychology 3, no. 2 (2006): 77–101. https://doi.org/10.1191/1478088706qp063oa.

Dasopang, Muhammad Darwis, HJ Sammali bin HJ Adam, and Ismail Fahmi Arrauf Nasution. “Integration of Religion and Culture in Muslim Minority Communities through Islamic Education.” Jurnal Pendidikan Islam 8, no. 2 (2022): 221–38. https://doi.org/10.15575/jpi.v8i2.19445.

Daud, Fathonah K, and Aden Rosadi. “Dinamika Hukum Keluarga Islam dan Isu Gender di Iran: Antara Pemikiran Elit Sekuler dan Ulama Islam.” Volksgeist: Jurnal Ilmu Hukum dan Konstitusi 4, no. 2 (2021): 205–2020. https://doi.org/10.24090/volksgeist.v4i2.5258.

Doka, Kenneth J., and Terry L. Martin. Grieving Beyond Gender. London: Routledge, 2011. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203886069.

Dutta, Sagnik. “Divorce, Kinship, and Errant Wives: Islamic Feminism in India, and the Everyday Life of Divorce and Maintenance.” Ethnicities 21, no. 3 (June 3, 2021): 454–76. https://doi.org/10.1177/1468796821999904.

Elmali-Karakaya, Ayse. “Interfaith Marriage in Islam: Classical Islamic Resources and Contemporary Debates on Muslim Women’s Interfaith Marriages.” Religions 13, no. 8 (2022): 726. https://doi.org/10.3390/rel13080726.

Fadhilah, Nur, and Muhammad Nurravi Alamsyah. “Reinterpreting Financial Responsibilities in Islamic Marriage a Maqasid al-Usrah Perspective.” Al-Syakhsiyyah: Journal of Law and Family Studies 7, no. 1 (2025): 1–26. https://doi.org/10.21154/syakhsiyyah.v7i1.

Fuadi, Moh Ashif, Moh Mahbub, Nor Huda Ali, Martina Safitry, and Irma Ayu Kartika Dewi. “Integration between Islamic Revelation and Local Culture: A Study of Theology and the Indigenisation of Islam in Indonesia.” Pharos Journal of Theology 105, no. 1 (2023). https://doi.org/10.46222/pharosjot.10527.

Glaser Chodik, Nurit, and Nehami Baum. “The Experience of Men Following Stillbirth: The Case of Israeli Bereaved Fathers.” Journal of Reproductive and Infant Psychology 43, no. 2 (2025): 443–58. https://doi.org/10.1080/02646838.2023.2237541.

Habaasa, Gilbert. “The Contribution of Social Norms and Religious Practices towards Low Death Registration in 3 HDSS Sites of Uganda.” BMC Health Services Research 22, no. 1 (2022): 1219. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12913-022-08589-9.

Hertz, Robert. “A Contribution to a Study of the Collective Representation of Death.” In Saints, Heroes, Myths, and Rites, 109–80. London: Routledge, 2016. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315632292-6.

Hugh-Jones, Stephen, Maurice Bloch, and Jonathan Parry. “Death and the Regeneration of Life.” Man 21, no. 1 (1986): 147. https://doi.org/10.2307/2802663.

Husni, Husni, and Walter Hayden. “The Epistemology of Ta’dib in Islamic Civilizational Discourse: Reviving and Reconstructing Contemporary Muslim Scholars’ Views.” Journal of al-Tamaddun 19, no. 1 (2024): 181–97. https://doi.org/10.22452/JAT.vol19no1.14.

Iqbal, Roshan. “Nurturing Gender Justice: Qurʾanic Interpretation and Muslim Feminist Thought.” Journal of Feminist Studies in Religion 39, no. 2 (2023): 59–61. https://doi.org/10.2979/jfs.2023.a908296.

Junaidi, Akhmad Arif. “Kongres Ulama Perempuan Indonesia (KUPI) and Mubādalah Approach in Interpreting the Gender Biased-Qur’anic Verses.” Sawwa: Jurnal Studi Gender 18, no. 1 (2023): 1–24. https://doi.org/10.21580/sa.v18i1.17269.

Kodir, Faqihuddin Abdul. Qira’ah Mubadalah: Tafsir Progresif Untuk Keadilan Gender Dalam Islam. Yogyakarta: IRCiSoD, 2019.

Lyons, Padraig, Maike Winters, Zangin Zeebari, Kirsten Schmidt-Hellerau, Paul Sengeh, Mohammad B. Jalloh, Mohamed F. Jalloh, and Helena Nordenstedt. “Engaging Religious Leaders to Promote Safe Burial Practices during the 2014–2016 Ebola Virus Disease Outbreak, Sierra Leone.” Bulletin of the World Health Organization 99, no. 4 (2021): 271–79. https://doi.org/10.2471/BLT.20.263202.

Ma’mun, Sukron, and Ibnu Akbar Maliki. “A Socio-Historical Study of Women’s Rights Advocacy in Islamic Legal Construction.” Journal of Southeast Asian Human Rights 7, no. 1 (2023): 1. https://doi.org/10.19184/jseahr.v7i1.39156.

Maciejewski, Paul K., Francesca B. Falzarano, Wan Jou She, Wendy G Lichtenthal, and Holly G Prigerson. “A Micro-Sociological Theory of Adjustment to Loss.” Current Opinion in Psychology 43 (2022): 96–101. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.copsyc.2021.06.016.

Mahdi, Saiful, Patrick Daly, Ida Fitria, Ibnu Mundzir, Dian Rubianty, Eka Srimulyani, and Jamie W. McCaughey. “Remarriage Strategies for Post-Disaster Widows and Widowers Following the 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami in Aceh, Indonesia.” Progress in Disaster Science 19 (2023): 100289. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.pdisas.2023.100289.

Metcalf, Peter, and Richard Huntington. Celebrations of Death: The Anthropology of Mortuary Ritual. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991. https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511803178.

Moussa, Mohammed. “Gendering a Critical Islamic Idiom.” Orient 56 (2021): 47–67. https://doi.org/10.5356/orient.56.47.

Musa, Mohd Faizal. “Transcripts of Gender, Intimacy, and Islam in Southeast Asia: The ‘Outrageous’ Texts of Raja Ali Haji and Khatijah Terung.” Religions 12, no. 3 (2021): 219. https://doi.org/10.3390/rel12030219.

Mustika, Dian, Yaswirman Yaswirman, Kurnia Warman, and Yasniwati Yasniwati. “Wives with the Double Burden: Measuring Gender Justice in the Division of Joint Property of Suku Anak Dalam (SAD) Batin Sembilan Viewed from the Principle of al-Musāwah.” Al-Istinbath: Jurnal Hukum Islam 10, no. 1 (2025): 407–28. https://doi.org/10.29240/jhi.v10i1.11023.

Nikmatullah, Nikmatullah. “Male Ulama Reinterpretation of the Gender Hadith in Indonesian Socio Cultural Contexts.” Pharos Journal of Theology, no. 105(2) (2024). https://doi.org/10.46222/pharosjot.105.213.

Nurhayati, Nurhayati, and Tri Bayu Purnama. “Funeral Processes during the COVID-19 Pandemic: Perceptions among Islamic Religious Leaders in Indonesia.” Journal of Religion and Health 60, no. 5 (2021): 3418–33. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10943-021-01418-z.

Peletz, Michael G. “Hegemonic Muslim Masculinities and Their Others: Perspectives from South and Southeast Asia.” Comparative Studies in Society and History 63, no. 3 (2021): 534–65. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0010417521000141.

Setyawati, Martyarini Budi, A. P. John Parsons, Bobbi Laing, Andrew Lynch, Imam Labib Habiburahman, and Farah Nuril Izza. “The Family Caregiving: A Rogerian Concept Analysis of Muslim Perspective Islamic Sources.” Heliyon 10, no. 3 (2024): e25415. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.heliyon.2024.e25415.

Shaikh, Sa’diyya. “Friendships, Fidelities and Sufi Imaginaries: Theorizing Islamic Feminism.” Religions 14, no. 9 (2023): 1082. https://doi.org/10.3390/rel14091082.

al-Sharmani, Mulki. “Islamic Feminist Hermeneutics: Between Scholarship and Lived Realities.” Journal of Feminist Studies in Religion 39, no. 2 (2023): 95–97. https://doi.org/10.2979/jfs.2023.a908305.

Sunuwati, Sunuwati, Siti Irham Yunus, and Rahmawati Rahmawati. “Gender Equality in Islamic Family Law: Should Men Take Iddah (Waiting Period after Divorce)?” Russian Law Journal 11, no. 3 (2023): 1132–38. https://doi.org/10.52783/rlj.v11i3.1504.

Supriyadi, Supriyadi, Abdul Qodir Zaelani, Siti Mahmudah, and Ahmad Khumedi Ja’far. “Building Husband and Wife Partnership Patterns among Regional Parliament (DPRD) Members from the Mubādalah Perspective.” Al-Istinbath: Jurnal Hukum Islam 8, no. 2 (2023): 445. https://doi.org/10.29240/jhi.v8i2.6972.

Topkara, Ufuk. “On Responsibility: Islamic Ethical Thought Engages with Jewish Ethical Thought.” Religions 16, no. 3 (2025): 274. https://doi.org/10.3390/rel16030274.

Umam, Fawaizul, and Mohamad Barmawi. “Indigenous Islamic Multiculturalism: Interreligious Relations in Rural East Java, Indonesia.” Ulumuna 27, no. 2 (2023): 649–91. https://doi.org/10.20414/ujis.v27i2.752.

Valentine, Christine. Bereavement Narratives: Continuing Bonds in the Twenty-First Century. London: Routledge, 2008. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203893364.

Yehene, Einat, Yossi Martin, and Gil Goldzweig. “An Analysis of Factors Predicting Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder and Grief Following Comrade Loss.” Omega - Journal of Death and Dying 90, no. 3 (2025): 971–89. https://doi.org/10.1177/00302228221113616.

Zaidah, Yusna, and Raihanah Abdullah. “The Relevance of Ihdad Regulations as a Sign of Mourning and Human Rights Restriction.” Journal of Human Rights, Culture and Legal System 4, no. 2 (2024): 422–48. https://doi.org/10.53955/jhcls.v4i2.229