Encyclopedia of Islam

Khadija bint Khuwaylid ibn Asad

  

427  J

---

mad

, well-known for his trustworthiness, to trade 

goods for her in Basra. It is reported that she sent 

Nafisa bint Umayya to propose marriage to the 

Prophet, who agreed to this, his first marriage. 

After marrying him (when her age was 40 and 

his was 25) she bore their sons al-Qasim and Abd 

Allah, and their daughters Zaynab, Ruqayyah, 

Umm Kulthum, and F

atima

. Only the daughters 

survived infancy.

Traditional accounts recall that after Muham-

mad received the first revelation of the q

Uran

, he 

sought refuge with Khadija, fearing that he had 

gone mad. She pacified and encouraged him, and 

consulted her cousin Waraqa ibn Nawfal, possibly 

a Christian, who affirmed Muhammad’s prophet-

hood. Offering Muhammad comfort and strength 

in his uncertainty and during his persecution, 

she is remembered for providing him with crucial 

moral and financial support.

Khadija was Muhammad’s only wife at the 

time of their marriage. It was not until after her 

death that he married other women. She bore 

all his children except Ibrahim, son of Mariya 

al-Qibtiya. Khadija herself, a widow, was married 

twice before her marriage to the Prophet.

She shares the title of “mother of the believ-

ers,” along with the other wives of the Prophet. 

In the 

hadith

 she is remembered as an exemplary 

and ideal Muslim woman, as a pious and honor-

able wife and mother. She has been held in high 

esteem by both Sunnis and Shiis. Khadija died 

roughly nine years after the emergence of Islam, 

precipitating a crisis in the life of Muhammad 

and his early followers that led to the h

iJra

to Medina about three years later in 622. She 

was buried in Mecca’s main cemetery, Hajun. 

Muhammad continued to live in her house until 

the Hijra. During the reign of Muawiya, the first 

Umayyad caliph (r. 661–680), her house was 

converted into a 

mosqUe

 and continued to be 

regarded as a shrine by pilgrims until destroyed 

by the Saudis in the 1980s.

See also 

ahl

 

al

-

bayt

; 

Women

.

Aysha A. Hidayatullah