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Fatwa CenterWife may ask for divorce if her husband is an adulterer
Question
Assalamo alikum; I have 2 questions. I shall appreciate if you please answer. 1) Will wife be punished if her husband does not forgive her after accusing her of neglecting him, being disrespectful to him, not responding to each and every call for intercourse, taking care of the wife’s parents more than him etc. 2) Will this wife be punished if she divorces her husband as per North American laws, because now this husband has started physical relation with another Muslim woman without formal marriage
Answer
All perfect praise be to Allaah, The Lord of the Worlds. I testify that there is none worthy of worship except Allaah, and that Muhammad 
is His Slave and Messenger.
As for your first question, it is obligatory for the wife to obey her husband, especially when he calls her to bed, i.e. for sexual intercourse. If she refuses to obey him in that, without a legitimate excuse, then she has committed a sin and has incurred the angels' curses upon her until the morning. This is confirmed in an authentic Hadeeth. For more details, please refer to Fatwa 95490.
The wife should try her best to reconcile between fulfilling the rights that both her husband and her parents have over her. In case of conflict, the husband's rights should be given priority because the obligation to obey the husband is more emphasized than that of parents as underlined in Fatwa 89708.
As for your second question, if you mean that the reason for requesting divorce or Khul‘ (i.e. divorce at the request of the wife who pays a compensation) is the husband's dissoluteness, then the answer is that the wife has the right to ask for divorce if her husband committed adultery or any other act of dissoluteness. Please refer to Fatwa 90481 and Fatwa 186355.
However, divorce issued by the regular courts (as opposed to Sharee'ah courts) is not considered effective as per a Fatwa issued by the Assembly of Muslim Jurists of America (AMJA). The Fatwa reads, "If the husband divorces his wife according to the Islamic Sharee'ah, there is no problem with authenticating it before regular courts run by man-made laws; however, resorting to non-Islamic courts in order to terminate the marriage contract according to the man-made laws does not by itself consequently end the marriage Islamically."
Therefore, the wife should ask her husband to divorce her or refer the case to an Islamic center to address the situation aptly.
Allaah Knows best.
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