Agenda

1. Welcome toALI 136 : Wives of the Holy Prophet (s)Session One______________________________________Academy for Learning IslamMarch 17, 2008www.academyofislam.com

2. Agenda • Accusations against the Prophet (s) • Understanding Polygamy • Reasons for multiple marriages of the Prophet (s) • The wives of the Prophet (s)

3. Accusations against the Prophet (s) • married many wives for his pleasure • married Aisha when she was very young • married Zainab binte Jahsh after Zaid divorced her because he was attracted to her

4. Quotes from non-Muslim historians • Montgomery Watt Of all the world’s great men, none has been so much maligned as Muhammad . . . For centuries Islam was the great enemy of Christendom, since Christendom was in direct with no other organized states comparable in power to the Muslims. One of the common allegations against Muhammad is that he was an imposter, who to satisfy his ambition and lust propagated religious teachings . . . Such insincerity makes the development of the Islamic religion incomprehensible. . . The other main allegations of moral defect in Muhammad are that he was treacherous and lustful . . . It is not so clear that the facts justify these allegations . . . Sufficient has been said above about the interpretation of these events to show that the case against Muhammad is much weaker than sometimes thought. Muhammad: Prophet and Statesman

5. Annemarie Schimmel One aspect of the Prophet’s life has always puzzled, bothered, even shocked, non-Muslim students of Islam: his attitude to women. At the end of his life he was married to nine wives. Someone raised in the Christian tradition, with its ascetic ideal of the celibate Jesus and its stress on monogamy, will of course have difficulty acknowledging that a true Prophet could have been married, nay even polygamous . . . One often forgets that Muhammad was married, for the better part of his life, only to one wife, Khadija, who was considerably senior to him. Only in his last thirteen years did he contract several other marriages, and even so . . . Khadija remained so much his ideal after her death that the young Aisha never ceased being jealous of her. And Muhammad is His Messenger Pp 49-50

6. Karen Armstrong The old hatred of Islam continues to flourish on both Sides of the Atlantic, and people have few scruples about attacking this religion, even if they know little about it. When the Muslim empire was established in the seventh Century CE, Europe was a backward region. Islam had quickly overrun much of the Christian world . . . This brilliant success was threatening; had God deserted the Christians and bestowed his favor on the infidel? . . Western scholars denounced Islam as a blasphemous faith and its Prophet Muhammad as the Great Pretender who had founded a violent religion of the sword in order to conquer the world. Muhammad A Biography of the Prophet (1992) pp 10-11

7. Karen Armstrong We have a long history of Islamophobia in Western culture that dates back to the time of the Crusades. In the twelfth century, Christian monks insisted that Islam was a violent religion of the sword, and that Muhammad was a charlatan who imposed his religion on a reluctant world by force of arms, they called him a lecher . . This distorted version of Islam became one of the received ideas of the West, and western people have always found it difficult to see Muhammad in a more objective light. Muhammad A Prophet for our time (2006) Page 17

8. Understanding Polygamy • Polygamy is not recommended, only allowed • It was very common in ancient societies. Islam restricted it. • Islam put conditions for the marrying of more than one wife. Marry such as you please, of women, twos, threes and fours; but if you apprehend that you shall not be able to deal justly with them, then marry one only. (4:3) • The rule is practical for certain situations Sometimes polygamy is better than divorce, or a hypocritical pretension of morality

9. Wives of the Prophet (s) • Khadijah bint Khuwailid • Sawdah bint Zamah • Aisha bint Abu Bakr • Hafsah bint Umar • Zainab Bint Khuzaymah • Umm Salamah • Zainab bint Jahsh • Juwayriyah bint al-Harith • Safiyah bint Huyayy • Umm Habibah • Maimuna al-Hilaliyyah • Raihana bint Zaid • Maria al-Qibtiyyah

10. Reasons for multiple marriages of the Prophet (s) • To look after and give respect to widows, slaves Sawdah, Umm Salamah, Zainab bint Khuzaimah, Maria • To strengthen political and tribal alliances Aisha, Hafsa, Juwairiyah, Umm Habibah, Maimunah, Safiyah, Raihana • To break wrong social systems and taboos Zainab binte Jahsh

11. Wives of the Prophet (s) Khadijah • The Prophet’s marriage to Khadijah • Relationship of the Prophet (s) and Khadijah • His love for her, even after her death Allah never gave me a better wife than Khadijah. She believed in me at a time when other people disbelieved me. She accepted me when other people denied me. She gave me her wealth when other people withheld from me their support. And God granted me children through her. Holy Prophet (s)

12. Aisha • reasons for marrying her • the age of Aisha Zainab binte Jahsh • reasons for the Prophet’s marriage to Zainab • reaction from Muslims at that time • reactions from historians But when Zaid divorced her, we gave her to you as a wife, so that there should be no difficulty for the believers in respect of the wives of their adopted sons . . . (33:37)