(marriage feast) and zifaf/rukhsati ("sending off" of bride and groom).

In addition to the requirement that a formal, binding contract - either oral or on paper - of rights and obligations for both parties be drawn up, there are a number of other rules for marriage in Islam: among them that there be witnesses to the marriage, a gift from the groom to the bride known as a mahr, that both the groom and the bride freely consent to the marriage; that the groom can be married to more than one woman (a practice