Fatwa No. 16 

Question:

I was engaged, then the engagement was broken due to problems between my father and my suitor(khateeb). My suitor wished to return after some time, but his financial circumstances are difficult. He and I exchange phone calls, through which we are trying to find a way to convince my father to complete the marriage contract, and to be patient until we are able to prepare the apartment. Naturally, some words of love find their way into our conversations. Is this permissible — given that my father knows how deeply attached I am to this young man?

Answer:

Al-ḥamdu lillāhi rabb al-ʿālamīn. To proceed:

It is not permissible for two engaged people to exchange feelings of love between them  for the engaged woman remains a legal stranger (ajnabiyyah) to her fiancé. Engagement does not render permissible what is otherwise forbidden in the relationship between the two parties. The conversation must either be appropriate and with propriety (bi-l-maʿrūf) confined to what must necessarily be discussed, such as the obstacles standing in the way of the engagement and how to resolve them and the like or the conversation must cease entirely until Allah decrees a matter that is to be fulfilled.

Engagement does not render the forbidden permissible, does not bring the distant close, does not demolish barriers, and does not remove boundaries.

Many people imagine that engagement is nothing but an outlet for young men and women  permitting them to pour out whatever overflows from their feelings and to give voice to whatever their hearts carry and their innermost selves conceal. Some even regard it as an outlet for releasing suppressed desire  so that eyes are unleashed, gazes widen, and tongues are set loose in a torrent. Some people stop at this point; others go further still, deeming every forbidden thing permissible in the name of engagement and obtaining everything they want in the name of love.

The truth is that none of this has anything to do with Islam.

Engagement (khiṭbah) is for deliberation, selection, consultation (istishārah), and istikhārah for examination and frank mutual disclosure  so that this solemn covenant (al-ʿaqd al-ghalīẓ) may proceed on sound footing, or so that the two parties may recognise that they have taken the wrong path and part ways.

And Allah Most High knows best.