Salutations to the Mother of Islam

Today is the day of grief on which the Prophet of Islam became a widower, and his one and only surviving daughter, Hazrat Fatema Zahra (peace upon her) became an orphan at a tender age.

“O soul at peace! Return to your Lord; pleased, pleasing. Then enter among My servants! And enter My paradise!”

What you read were ayahs 27 to 30 of Surah Fajr of the holy Qur’an. As we said,   today is the peaceful departure from the mortal world to the ethereal heavens of a lady who was completely resigned to the Will of the Lord Most High, to such an extent that she spent all her proverbial wealth in the way of God, leaving nothing as inheritance for her only surviving child.

She is the same sincere lady who on being informed of God’s greetings to her by her loyal husband, the Prophet of Islam, through the medium of Archangel Gabriel, said in a tone of further gratitude:

“Lord! You are the Peace; from You is the peace, and to You returns the peace; Praised and Exalted are You, O One with all the Greatness and Honours – and peace unto Gabriel as well.”

The aggrieved husband, after the funeral bath, shrouded her in his own cloak for burial, as the orphaned little daughter wept, at the start of the period of mourning known in history as “Aam al-Hozn” or Year of Grief, because before the year’s end the bereaved widower would lose to the cold hands of death his loving guardian-uncle as well.

The identity of this virtuous lady ought to be clear by now. She is none other Khadija bint Khwailed (peace upon her), whom Prophet Mohammad (blessings of God upon him and his progeny) hailed as one of the four most noble-ever ladies of all time – the other three being Asiya the virtuous monotheist wife of the tyrannical Egyptian Pharoah, the Virgin Mary the Mother of Prophet Jesus, and the Prophet of Islam’s own Immaculate Daughter Fatema Zahra (peace upon her). It was but natural of the Prophet that during the 25 years of marital bliss he spent with her, he never took another spouse.

Hazrat Khadija (peace upon her) remains not just the only rightful Omm al-Momenin or Mother of all True Believers, but as the Mother of the Saadaat (that is, the Prophet’s progeny), she could be called the “Mother of Islam”, in view of the fact that it was her wealth as the Richest Lady of Arabia that fed, clothed, and provided shelter to the persecuted neo-Muslim community of Mecca, especially during the three year socio-economic boycott imposed on the Prophet and his followers by the pagan Arabs, whose nefarious designs were foiled because of Abu Taleb’s yeoman efforts in taking them all under his care in the gorge outside the city known till this day as “Sh’eb Abi Taleb”.

The Prophet of Peace used to say: “No money was profitable than the wealth of Khadija (peace upon her)” that was spent on paying the debts of debtors, and on orphans and the poor.

Such dedication and generosity by Khadija (AS) was accepted by God and considered as gifts to the Prophet for the cause of protecting, strengthening and spreading Islam.

No wonder, God says in the holy Qur’an, in ayah 8 of Surah az-Zoha in reference to His Last and Greatest Messenger, Prophet Mohammad (blessings of God upon him and his progeny):

“Did He not find you needy, and enrich you?”

Hazrat Khadija (peace upon her) was not just super rich in gold, silver, livestock, lands and other material possessions, but was wealthy in wisdom, purity of character, knowledge and self-dignity as well, in addition to her unflinching faith in the One and Only God, even before her marriage to the future Prophet and the advent of Islam, since her ancestors like that of her husband, were monotheist descendants of Prophet Ishmael and Prophet Abraham (peace upon them).

As the prominent Sunni Muslim scholar Ibn al-Jowzi has remarked in his writings: “Khadija (peace upon her) was known for her knowledge, fairness, progress and desire for spirituality and perfection; since her young age she was an honourable and virtuous woman among Arabs in Hejaz.”

This was the reason she rejected the notable and wealthy suitors of the Qoraish, and at the age of 28 this chaste and virgin lady preferred to marry her distant cousin, the poor 25-year old son of Abdullah, whose honesty, integrity, and trustworthiness as manager of her trade caravans, had greatly impressed her.

In other words, this farsighted lady was in quest of, and achieved, peace of mind, tranquility of heart, salvation in afterlife, and paradise as eternal reward, in addition to lasting name and fame in the transient world as Mother of the Noblest-Ever Lady, Hazrat Fatema Zahra (peace upon her), whom Allah has hailed in the holy Qur’an as “Kowthar” or Spring of Perpetual Abundance, in contrast to her husband’s enemies, who are issueless (or called abtar) – their line of descent having long ended despite their boasting of having fathered sons.

The pagan Arabs who later became reluctant Muslims, but they and their ill-begotten brood continued to harbour malice towards the Prophet’s Ahl al-Bayt, have heaped all sorts of lies against Khadija and that other primordial Muslim, Abu Taleb. Their misled descendants should, for the sake of their own fate in the Hereafter, closely study Islam from its original sources, that is, the Household of the Messenger of Mercy, instead of continuing the seditious ways of the Salaf or pagan progenitors.

A firm proof of the faith of these blessed personalities in the One and Only God is the sermon of Abu Taleb while solemnizing the marriage of his nephew with Hazrat Khadija (peace upon her):

“All praise is due to Allah Who has made us the progeny of Abraham, the seed of Ishmael, the descendants of Ma’ad, the substance of Mudar, and Who made us the custodians of His House and the servants of its sacred precincts, making for us a House sought for pilgrimage and a shrine of security, and He also gave us authority over the people. This nephew of mine, Mohammad, cannot be compared with any other man: If you compare his wealth with that of others, you will not find him a man of wealth, for wealth is a vanishing shadow and a fickle thing. Muhammad is a man whose lineage you all know, and he has sought Khadija daughter of Khwailed for marriage, offering her such-and-such of the dower of my own wealth.”

No wonder, years later in Medina, after having married some nine women out of social necessity, the middle-aged Prophet who used to cherish the memory of Khadija, told one of his erring wives who dared to call herself a young and better one:

“Never did God give me a better wife than her. When people didn’t believe in me, she believed. When people belied me, she confirmed me and when they didn’t support me, she supported me by her properties and the Almighty and Glorious God granted me children by her while I did not have children by other women.” 

In every age and place, whenever Islam was in danger it was the offspring of Hazrat Khadija (peace upon her) that sprang to the defence of Islam, the supreme example being the sacrifice of her grandson, Imam Husain (AS) at Karbala.

AS/MG