Similar to other Muslim-majority countries, Indonesia has undertaken legislative changes in the domain of family law, including on polygamy. In practice, however, these legal reforms continue to be challenged by a number of judges, specifically those regarding polygamy. This paper looks at the extent to which judges meet husbands’ proposals for polygamy. It investigates judges’ legal interpretation of the legal grounds specified for polygamous marriage and how judges have deployed the notions of maslahah (public good) and mafsadah (harm), with a view to fortifying their legal decisions. It will be argued that the judges’ approach remains shaped by classical Islamic legal doctrine and that they subscribe to free and supplementary legal interpretation, or ijtihad, as well as contemporary notions of maslahah, resulting in conservative legal decisions that uphold gender asymmetries. It is also found that, even though many women may choose to share husbands rather than to be divorced, judges seem to ignore the fact that the practice of polygamy is detrimental to the dissolution of the marriage through wife-petitioned divorce.

与其他穆斯林占多数的国家类似，印度尼西亚在家庭法领域，包括一夫多妻制方面进行了立法修改。但是实际上，这些法律改革仍然受到许多法官的挑战，特别是关于一夫多妻制的法官。本文着眼于法官在多大程度上满足丈夫提出的一夫多妻制。它调查了法官对一夫多妻制婚姻的法律依据的法律解释，以及法官如何运用maslahah（公益）和mafsadah（损害）的概念，以加强其法律决定。有人认为，法官的做法仍然受古典伊斯兰法律学说的影响，他们赞成自由和补充的法律解释，即ijtihad，以及现代的maslahah概念，导致了维护性别不对称的保守法律裁决。还发现，即使许多妇女可能选择分享丈夫而不是离婚，法官似乎也忽略了一夫多妻制的做法不利于通过妻子上婚而离婚的事实。