CD5-The Marriage to Khadija (ra) and Reasons of Marriages

CD5
By:Imam Anwar Awlaki

The Marriage of Rasul Allah (saw) to Khadija (ra)

Khadija was a well-known and prosperous woman in Makkah, not married, and elder in age. She has a business of trading from Makkah to Ash-Sham. In Surah Al-Quraish, it documents their journey going from Makkah to Syria and coming back, one in the winter and the other in summer. Khadija hired men to work for her and take care of her business and she hired the Prophet Muhammad (saw) since she heard of his honesty. She had her servant, Maisarah, accompany the Prophet (saw) during his journey. When he went to Ash-Sham and back, Maisarah told Khadija that the Prophet’s trustworthiness and honesty is amazing, and she was praising Rasul Allah. Khadija became interested in him and thought his character was admirable, so she said that she wanted to marry Rasul Allah (saw) and he agreed.

He was 25, and she was 40, and he never married anyone else before Khadija passed away. All of the children of Rasul Allah were from Khadija (Fatima, Zainab, Ruqayyah, Umm Kulthum, al-Qaasim, and Abdullah). Rasul Allah loved Khadija so much and his loyalty even after she passed away by always remembering her and always mentioning her and that sometimes would cause jealousy among the other wives. He had so much respect for her because Khadija was the one who stood up for him and supported him when everybody else betrayed him.

Aisha (ra) would sometimes feel jealousy and said: “I did not become jealous of any of the wives of Rasul Allah except Khadija. And I had not seen her. The Prophet (saw) used to slaughter a sheep and would send the meat to the friends of Khadija. And one day I angered him by replying out of jealousy, and Rasul Allah said ‘I have been given by Allah her love’. In another hadeeth, Aisha said: “The Messenger of Allah used to not leave his home without praising Khadija, one of the days he praised her and out of jealousy I said ‘was she not but an elder woman that Allah has replaced for you with what is better?’ He became angered and said ‘No, by Allah, He did not send me a replacement with someone better for she had faith in me when the people rejected, she believed me when the people belied me, she made comfortable with what she had when the people denied me, and Allah has blessed me with children from her.”

This also shows us an aspect of the character of Rasul Allah, about his loyalty to those whom he loved. Before Rasul Allah (saw) passed away, one of the things he did was go and visit the cemetery of his friends who died in the Battle of Uhud. There were 70 companions, and when he felt that he was about to leave this world, he went to the cemetery and made dua’ for them, and he mentions in that dua’ that soon they will meet. He missed them so much that he wanted to be close to them and to join them together in Jannah. He had a strong relationship with the Sahabah and Khadija who stood with him in moments of difficulty.

Khadija was a special person. Jibril descended to Rasul Allah (saw) and said: “Khadija is going to approach you now and she is carrying some food. When she arrives, tell her Allah is giving her salaam and tell her that I am giving her salaam.” And then Jibril said: “and give her the glad tidings of a palace in Paradise.” Khadija is one of the four greatest women that ever lived. Rasul Allah (saw) said that they are Maryam bint ‘Imran, Khadija bint Khuwaylid, Fatimah bint Muhammad, and Asiyah bint Muzah. All of these women had something to do with a Nabi. Two were mothers of the prophets (Maryam was the mother of ‘Isa (as) and Asiyah brought up Musa (as), Khadija was the wife of Rasul Allah, and Fatimah was his daughter.

Refutations to the claims of the enemies of Islam to smear the reputation of Rasul Allah (saw)

1. Rasul Allah (saw) reached the age of 25 and he was known as chaste in an environment that was corrupt. Aisha (ra) relates that there are four relationships between men and women in Makkah at that time. One was marriage, or brothels that were legal in Makkah and they have flags to indicate, women would sleep with men up to 10 and she can call this men in and can pick any one for the father of her child, a man would allow his wife to sleep with a noble man so that they would have a noble lineage. He was able to stay away from all of these corruptions until he got married to someone older than him and a widow.

2. He could have chosen for himself any women from Makkah. But he chose Khadija and remained to be married until he was 50 years old (25 years together) and it is a clear indication that he was noble and honorable in his intentions.

3. Khadija passes away and he remains a bachelor for 2-3 years. Later on he marries another widow, Saudah (ra). Reason for him marrying her was that her husband died and she was in Abyssinia. Out of his care for his companions he married her to provide for her. In the last ten years of his life he married many women and left behind 9 wives when he passed away.

Reasons for his marriages:

1. To forge alliances – when we study the marriage life and look at his life comprehensively, he devoted all of his efforts for the promotion of Islam, even his decision of marriage. He married them to bring the tribes closer to Islam like his marriage to Juwairiyah which ended up making the whole tribe of Banu Mustalaq Muslims.

2. Caring for his Companions – like the example of Saudah (ra).

3. Rasul Allah wanted to strengthen his ties with his closest companions – he had a strong brotherly feeling towards them. The relationship he had with the Sahaba was so strong and they were together through hardship and ease. So he married the daughter of Abu Bakr and Umar ibn al-Khattab. And he married his daughter to Uthman. When his daughter passed away, he gave his other daughter. And when she passed away, Rasul Allah (saw) said: “If I had 99 daughters, I would marry them to Uthman one after another.” He married his most beloved daughter, Fatima, to Ali bin Abi Talib.

4. Conveying the religion – we are to follow his Sunnah as a statesman, imam, teacher, military leader, and as a family man. Rasul Allah (saw) did not have many children, so the wives would be the ones who would be able to convey to us how he was with his family. If he had only one wife, it would be difficult for this wife to recall every aspect of the family life of Rasul Allah, and she could easily be discredit because she was only one source. His family life is one of the most important aspects of his Sunnah for it relates to every one of us. Therefore, he had multiple wives so that they could convey to us this body of knowledge of how the Prophet (saw) conducted himself in his private life. Therefore it was important for Rasul Allah to have multiple wives and why he was excluded from the limit of four or less due to his special circumstances as a protection of His religion.

The most targeted marriages of Rasul Allah (saw) were his marriages to Aisha (ra) and Zainab bint Jahsh (ra). Aisha because he married her at the age of 6 and consummated the marriage at the age of 9, while Zainab was the wife of his adopted son and then Rasul Allah (saw) married her later on.

It just so happens that these marriages are the only two marriages that are divinely instructed. His marriage to Zainab was instructed in the Qur’an in Surah Al-Ahzab. “When Zayd left her, We commanded you to marry her.” And the marriage to Aisha was divinely inspired through the dream he saw, as he says: “Jibril (as) came to me and I saw you (Aisha) covered behind a silk curtain, and when I would uncover you I saw you and Jibril told me ‘this is your wife in Dunyah and in Akhirah’.” And he saw this dream twice, and as we know all dreams of the prophets are revelations and true.

The marriage to Aisha was so important because one of the greatest blessings of Allah to us as Muslims is that Rasul Allah (saw) married her. It was one of the best things that happened to us. She had the mind of a scholar, very bright and intelligent, and had an inquisitive nature. Aisha says of herself: “The companions of Rasul Allah used to hear the hadeeth and immediately followed it, while I used to ask Rasul Allah questions about it.” Being the wife and most beloved had this informal relationship with Rasul Allah (saw) so she could afford to question him and ask him while the others wouldn’t dare do that. But Aisha being young and playful, Rasul Allah could say something and she could ask and could argue. She became one of the greatest scholars of Islam. She comes fourth in the list of the top narrators of ahadeeth.
1. Abu Hurayrah (5000+)
2. Abdullah Ibn Umar (2600)
3. Anas bin Malik
4. Aisha (2200)

· Other marriages of Rasul Allah include Umm Habibah, the daughter of Abu Sufyan who was in Abbysinia and whose husband converted to Christianity. Later on, her husband passed away and Rasul Allah (saw) sent a letter to Najashi for him to marry Umm Habibah because Rasul Allah had sympathy for what she went through. Rasul Allah (saw) also wanted to soften the stance of his enemies since Abu Sufyan was happy that this marriage took place. He said: “And who is better to marry than Muhammad?” Abu Sufyan knows the lineage of Rasul Allah, from Banu Hashim so he was proud and happy his daughter married Rasul Allah.

· Umm Salamah was one of the ones who made hijrah to Abyssinia and came back to Madinah and when Abu Salamah passed away, he married her to take care of the wives of his companions. He was the caretaker of this ummah.

· An important event happened during his life. A flood happened and affected the structure of Al-Ka’bah, located in the low valley of the mountains. The flood caused cracks in the walls of Al-Ka’bah, so they rebuilt it. Al-Ka’bah has been built and re built 4 or 5 times depending on who was the first to build it. There is a difference of opinion of whether it was Ibrahim or Adam. However, the majority opinion is that it was Ibrahim. Those who say it was Adam don’t contradict the Qur’an since it is mentioned that Ibrahim was raising the foundations of the House, meaning that there was already something there for them to raise it. But the common belief amongst our scholars is that it was Ibrahim. However, there is no dispute about the holiness of the place since the earth was created. And we know that it was the first house to be built for the remembrance of Allah. “First House established for My worship is the one in Bakkah (Makkah).”

1. Ibrahim built it
2. When Makkah was flooded, the people of Quraish wanted to rebuild it. They had to tear it down but none of them agreed to make that move. They were waiting with their equipment but no one moved because of the honor and respect they had for Al-Ka’bah even though they were Mushrikeen at that time but they feared Allah and thought it was dangerous. One of them said that he and his sons would do it so they came in the morning and started tearing it down whilst saying to Allah not to be afraid and that they only want good. This is a wrong concept they held about the greatness of Allah, since Allah knows what’s in their hearts. They brought wood from a Roman ship that had crashed and this became the first roof of Al-Ka’bah to be built.

The people of Quraish knew that money from interest was no good, and they made a decision that they will only use pure money. They ran short of funds so they shortened it from a rectangular shape to a square to save money. The area of al-Ka’bah which they excluded was the area of Al-Hijr, an enclosed area in a semi-circle that used to be part of the original building of Al-Ka’bah. It also used to have two gates and they made it one, and raised the doorstep, which means that you had to climb to get into it. Rasul Allah says, while talking to Aisha: “Don’t you know that your people had insufficient funds for the expenses, if it were not for the fact that your people were recently unbelievers, I would have torn down the Ka’bah and made for it one door in the east and one door in the west and I would have included the Hijr area within it.” When he opened Makkah, he wanted to restructure Ka’bah in its original foundations, but then he told Aisha that the reason why he wasn’t going to do this is because your people just became Muslim, still soft and eman is weak so it might become fitnah for them.

· There is an important lesson to be learned here and it is that the Da’ee has to keep in mind the condition of the people into consideration. Abdullah bin Mas’ood says: “When you tell the people something that is beyond their comprehension, or understanding, or eeman, it might become a trial for some of them.”

The reason why the Quraish made the door high is so that they could control who comes in and out of the Ka’bah, it was a matter of show of power.
Rasul Allah (saw) participated in the rebuilding of Ka’bah and reached to the holiest part of the Ka’bah, which is the black stone. They had a dispute about who would have the honor of placing the black stone because every tribe wanted to contribute. But every tribe wanted to put the black stone until they sought a resolution by Ommaya, the oldest man among them. He had a suggestion and said that let’s agree that the first man to walk in towards Al-Ka’bah will be given the complete authority in judging between us. They all gathered and waited for the first person to come, and it was the Prophet Muhammad (saw). They all stood up and said: “The truthful and the trustworthy, we all agree.” They knew of his fairness and they were pleased with this turn of events.

Rasul Allah (saw) told them to get a piece of clothe, and he placed the black stone in the middle of it and asked a representative from each clan to hold the cloth from one side, and they all raised it up together at the same time. Therefore every one of them participated in the lifting of the black stone, and when they reached the place where the black stone is situated, he picked up the black stone and placed it there. So it was rasul Allah who put the black stone in its spot.

3. Years later, Abdullah bin Zubair became the Amir of Makkah, and knew of the hadith regarding the structure of Al-Ka’bah that the Prophet (saw) wanted when the Ka’bah was burnt during the war between ibn Zubair and Bani Umayya. That damage could’ve been fixed without tearing down the Ka’bah but he wanted to take advantage of it and build the Ka’bah on its original foundation and fulfill the description stated by Rasul Allah in the hadeeth which he did.

4. Ibn Zubair was killed and Hajjaj bin Yusuf took over and the khalifah at that time Malik bin Marwan was not familiar with this hadeeth so he gave his commands to rebuild the Ka’bah to the way it was before Ibn Zubair rebuilt it. So the Ka’bah was shortened again according to the way the people of Quraish built it. After the khilafah of Bani Umayya, Banu’l Abbas took over and one of the member was thinking of rebuilding the Ka’bah again back to its original foundations (rectangular) and he consulted Imam Malik, but he told the Khalifah that “we do not want Al-Ka’bah to become a toy in the hands of kings. They keep changing its size every now and then, even though Rasul Allah’s wish is to keep it on the foundations of Ibrahim, but let’s keep it and not change it anymore.” It was a very wise advice from Imam Malik and the Khalifah followed it.

· The Ka’bah that we have today is built on the foundation of Quraish. But this is something good because if it was built on foundations of Ibrahim, we would’ve been deprived of the pleasure of praying inside the Ka’bah but since it is shortened, the area of the semi circle is still part of Al-Ka’bah and if we pray there it would be like we prayed inside the Ka’bah. And we know that the Prophet (saw), when he conquered Makkah, prayed 8 rak’ah inside Al-Ka’bah. So now we have the chance to pray inside al-Hijr and it would be counted as if you prayed inside the Ka’bah.

· Over the time, the height of the Ka’bah increased but the size of it remained the same. The stones that the Ka’bah are built of some of the stones that were used by Ibrahim (as). Other ones were introduced later but the Black Stone has never changed since the time of Ibrahim.
· There were many stories about the Black Stone, and there is an authentic hadeeth that the Prophet (saw) said: “the Black Stone was white but it turned black due to the sins of the sons of Adam.” And another one that states that it is the right hand of Allah on earth. It is very special and honored and respected and the only part of Ka’bah that is kissed and pointed from a distance.

· The Prophet (saw) would leave Makkah and spend time in the Cave of Hira’ in a mountain that is fairly close to Makkah. He would take some food and stay in seclusion in this cave worshipping Allah. From the cave, you can see Al-Ka’bah. He would spend nights and days there worshipping before prophet hood. It was a chance for him to reflect and contemplate on Allah and Allah was also training him through these moments of reflection for they purify the heart. Sa’eed Hawwa comments on this and says “Solitude was a tradition of some who would seek the guidance of Allah with the remembrance of Allah and worship. It was used to illuminate the hearts and remove its shadows by disconnecting it from its heedlessness and desires. Some would advice this at the beginning of the journey to belief, as this was the example of the Prophet when he spent time in solitude before and at the beginning of his prophethood.” As a muslim, you are recommended to spend some time alone in dhikr, remembering Allah.

· One should not go to extreme of going away from society completely or to indulge into the society completely. We should go through the middle road, by spending some time with people and socializing while also spending time alone between us and Allah. Qiyam-ul-Layl is a chance for solitude, praying at night alone and the sincerity is pure for the sake of Allah. It purifies the heart, and it is known that too much laughing and socializing obscures the heart and veils it. Spending some time worshipping Allah in solitude is the cure for this. Allah said: “Behold! In the creation of the Heavens and the Earth and the alternation of the night and day, there are indeed signs for men of understanding, men who celebrate the praises of Allah, standing, sitting, and lying down on their sides. And contemplate the wonders of creation in the Heavens and the Earth with the thought, ‘Our Lord not for naught has Thou created all this. Glory to You and give us salvation from the chastisement of the Fire.”