The argument keeps coming back, and it often serves as an exit: this marriage has no love in it.
Sheikh Abd as-Salam ash-Shuwayir answers that this needs qualifying, and he begins with an observation about the nature of the feeling itself: love and aversion are relative, one may love a thing today and come to hate it the next day.
Then he cites Umar, may Allah be pleased with him: are all houses built on love? People live together with kindness.
The second word is what counts. A home does not rest on the intensity of a feeling, which varies, but on kindness, which is decided. That is precisely why the Legislation commanded living with them in kindness, and not feeling any particular emotion.
Which does not excuse hiding it
This qualification gives no licence for coldness, and Sheikh Sulayman ar-Ruhayli says so without sparing husbands.
He observes that a man's nature generally does not incline toward words, and that some husbands consequently neglect their wife's need to be shown love and spoken to with good words. He adds that this is one of the important foundations of life between spouses.
And he recalls the scene: the Prophet was asked who among people was dearest to him. He answered: Aisha. Reported by al-Bukhari and Muslim.
The Prophet named his wife, publicly, to a direct question. The model is there.
Tenderness in ordinary gestures
Sheikh ar-Ruhayli also cites what Aisha reported: they would wash from a single vessel placed between them, he would get to the water before her and she would ask him to leave her some. Reported by Muslim.
This hadith delivers no ruling. It shows a climate: a simple, almost playful ease between two spouses. It is a useful correction for anyone who imagines the prophetic household as a solemn place.
And on the wives' side
The same sheikh reports the words of the wife of Said ibn al-Musayyib: they would speak to their husbands only with the regard due to a governor, choosing the finest expressions.
The demand is therefore reciprocal, and it falls on the same ground: speech. One must not fall silent, the other must weigh her words.
What to take away
No, love is not a condition of validity. It is not among the conditions of the contract, which we cover in our article on the wali and the one on consent.
But the absence of love is not in itself grounds for rupture either, and the absence of gestures is not excused by temperament. Kindness is owed, and it is expressed.