At 84, anyone outside of King Solomon’s court would assume that Mohammed Bello Abubakar has fewer lives than years lived on this earth. But they’d be wrong. The Nigerian Muslim has 86 wives. Forget remembering anniversaries at that point: Does he even know all of their names?
“A man with 10 wives would collapse and die, but my own power is given by Allah. That is why I have been able to control 86 of them,” he told the BBC. “I don’t go looking for them, they come to me. I will consider the fact that God has asked me to do it and I will just marry them.”
The BBC reports that Muslim scholars agree the Quran allows for up to four wives, if they can be treated equally. Bello Abubaker, though disagrees. “To my understanding the Koran does not place a limit and it is up to what your own power, your own endowment and ability allows,” he said.
Not surprisingly, Nigerian Islamic authorities consider the family way outside the mainstream; the BBC characterizes its reputation as cultish.
“Talk about extremists!” Ahmed Khatib, not one of the aforementioned authorities, quipped on his blog.
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