<![CDATA[Early marriage remains a persistent challenge in Islamic family law and Indonesia’s legal policy, revealing a critical gap between formal minimum-age regulations and the absence of substantive instruments to assess marital readiness. Existing legal frameworks emphasize age compliance but inadequately address psychological, relational, economic, and health preparedness, particularly within administrative practices at the Office of Religious Affairs (ORA). This study fills the gap by integrating classical fiqh concepts ‘aql (intellect), rushd (maturity), and ahliyyah (legal capacity) with a contemporary, multidimensional assessment model of marriage readiness. This research employs a qualitative method with normative-juridical and socio-legal approaches, analyzing classical fiqh literature, Indonesian marriage regulations, and contemporary Islamic family policy. The findings demonstrate that Islamic jurisprudence substantively supports a multidimensional framework of readiness beyond formal age limits. The study establishes a premarital competency model comprising four domains: psychological-emotional maturity, religious understanding and family relations, basic economic readiness, and physical-reproductive health. Positioned as an administrative-substantive instrument rather than a determinant of marital validity, this model represents an institutional form of ijtihad within public services. Theoretically, it advances Maqasid al-Shari‘ah-based discourse on family protection; practically, it offers a policy-oriented framework to strengthen ORA’s role in promoting sustainable and resilient family formation.]]>
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