Aisha bint Abu Bakar (R.A.), the third and youngest wife of the Prophet Muhamad ﷺ, comes on the top of the list amongst the other Ummahatul Mu’mineen of the Prophet ﷺ, in terms of spreading the messages and teachings of Islam after the Prophet ﷺ for more or less 44 years. Setting an exemplary model for female teachers in a male centric era, she has been hailed for her knowledge in spiritual as well as political grounds. In fact, she has been considered one of the greatest scholars in Islam who conveyed more than 2000 hadith of the Prophet ﷺ. The mere fact that would suffice to signify her status among the other wives of the Prophet ﷺ is that the Prophet ﷺ spent his last moment with her and his tomb was erected in her room itself.

There are many more such things that we need to know about Aisha bint Abu Bakar (R.A.) and with that we would be able to get the actual standpoint of Islam regarding the unbiased approaches towards male and females even during the jahiliyya era. This article will shed light on some of the 4 best attributes from the life of Aisha bint Abu Bakar (R.A.) that she was adorned with and try to unearth how important her involvement was in the growth and development of Islam during the formative stage of it. Before we dive into the topic, there are so many allegations and accusations of pedophilia against the Prophet ﷺ due to his marriage with ummul mu’mineen Ayesha bint Abu Bakar that are matter of diffrent discussion and account. The attributes that would be enumerated here would be of lesson worthy and slander to some of the imputations raised against Islam and its ethical values and principles.

1- She is an exemplary scholar

Aisha (R.A.) being the youngest wife of the Prophet ﷺ was blessed to have a huge opportunity to spread the teachings and preachings of the Prophet ﷺ after his demise. She mostly has narrated the actions and demeanors of the Prophet ﷺ inside the house and helped people know how the Prophet ﷺ actually slept, dealt with wives, his prayers routine, his thought process, and many more such delicate topics.

After the Prophet ﷺ, she dedicated her life to the teachings of Islam and continued this service for around 44 years until she passed away. Because of her intelligence and mastery over the jurisprudence and amazing experience with the Prophet ﷺ, the companions of the Prophet ﷺ used to come to her to get better understanding of the intricacies of the rulings in the deen and she wholeheartedly used to participate as much as she could. She has narrated around 2210 hadith of the Prophet Muhamad ﷺ which includes the matters of the inheritance, medications, poetry, history and many others. Because of this caliber of her and companionship of the Prophet ﷺ, she has been considered as one of the greatest scholars in Islamic history irrespective of the fact that she is a female.

This also breaks the shackles of allegations that have been raised against Islam that it is the religion of patriotic values and misogynistic approaches. It is from the basic tenets of Islam that it encouraged the Muslims for the acquisition of knowledge irrespective of gender and what we see today of scholars’ negative stance on female education is a bit of precautious approach that women should not get involved in any sort of trouble due to amalgamation of inter-gender education. In some cases, what we see of family law delegates has nothing to do with Islam and it doesn’t represent Islamic law in its true sense. To understand Islam better, we need to get back to Islamic principles and values rather than evaluating it with the culture and the tradition of what Muslims practice. (https://en.islamonweb.net/education-of-muslim-women-islam-versus-culture This is my article on female education subjugation. You can use it here somewhere in hyperlink, if you would love to. You may put it in the red coloured text, if wanted)

2- Allah’s defense to Aisha (R.A.) against the rumor of zinā

During one of the expeditions with the Prophet Muhamad ﷺ, Aisha (R.A.) was left behind by the caravan. When Safwan bin Mu’attal, who was on another journey, saw her and helped her to get back to the caravan, the hypocrites started making allegations of zina against her. This misinformation was hyped in such a manner, that even the believers fell prey to this propaganda and started believing it. With her return, Aisha (R.A.) fell ill and she was later on informed that something fishy was going on behind her. In fact, this event has changed the behavior of the Prophet ﷺ with her too but he kept silent waiting for signs from Allah the Almighty. One day Aisha (R.A.) asked for the Prophet’s ﷺ permission and went to her parents’ home. One day, when the Prophet ﷺ visited her and asked her to repent if she had sinned, she started crying and appealed to Allah to show her chastity as others were losing their belief upon her.

Therein, when Allah saw how helpless she was feeling regarding her innocence and there was nothing else to help her out except Quranic revelation, He sent his archangel Gabriel with the revelation and the Prophet Muhamad ﷺ within a matter of minutes became sweat which indicated he recently received revelation. After the revelation, the Prophet ﷺ gave the good news to Aisha (R.A.) and with this she felt a sigh of relief against all the rumors that have been so far spreaded to tarnish her and the Prophet’s ﷺ image in front of the Muslims by the disbelievers. These verses are available in chapter 24 of Surah Nūr from verse 11-20. These verses show how important it was to Allah to save Aisha’s (R.A.) chastity and rebuke the slander, that He revealed verses of the Quran upon her and showed her status among the other Muslims. This is evident that Islam cherishes its female and thus Allah Himself sent down words to protect the chastity of women and ward off the accusations raised.

3- Prophet’s ﷺlove and compassion for Aisha (R.A.) and vise versa

There are a number of narrations about the love and compassion of the Prophet ﷺ for Aisha (R.A.) and vice versa that show how considerate the Prophet ﷺ was about her wives with special consideration to Aisha (R.A.). Aisha (R.A.) used to enjoy the times when she found the Prophet ﷺ beside her and the Prophet ﷺ used to enjoy the meals when she sat next to him in the meals. The Prophet ﷺ used to place his lips where Aisha (R.A.) had placed her lips and eat from the bone of meat with his mouth where Aisha (R.A.) had placed her mouth. In fact, the Prophet ﷺ used to put morsels of food into her mouth and she would do the same with him to show love and compassion in return.

In other hadiths, it can be found that the Prophet ﷺ used to use code languages with each other denoting their love. When one of the companions of the Prophet ﷺ asked him “who is the most beloved to your heart?” he answered straight away “Aisha”. This behavior of the Prophet ﷺ and Aisha (R.A.) is an exemplary model for the modern generation to learn how important it is to be romantic to the partner and always strive to keep the spouse happy as much as possible. But one thing that has to be paid extensive attention to is that it is not the responsibility of any certain partner to take care and show love and compassion, rather both the wife and husband would have to know their priorities and act accordingly.

4- The Prophet Muhamad’s ﷺlast moments were with Aisha (R.A.)

The Prophet ﷺ had spent his last moments in this world with Aisha (R.A.). When the Prophet Muhamad ﷺ felt that he would no longer be in this mortal world, he requested to stay with Aisha (R.A.). During these days, Aisha (R.A.) used to pay special attention to his affairs. When the Prophet ﷺ asked for miswak, she chewed the the end of the miswak so that the Prophet ﷺ would get the bristles soft and it would help him clean his teeth. Similarly, the moment when the soul of the Prophet ﷺ was taken, he was in the lap of Aisha (R.A.) and from therein he left this mortal world. Narrating this incident, Aisha (R.A.) herself has mentioned: “It was one of the favors of Allah towards me that Allah’s Messenger ﷺ expired in my house…while he was leaning against my chest and Allah made my saliva mix with his saliva at his death” (Bukhari). To accentuate, it can be seen that when the Prophet ﷺ passed away, the companions of the Prophet ﷺ opted Aisha’s (R.A.) room to be the Prophet Muhamad’s ﷺ tomb as he spent the last moments of him with her in her room.

Conclusion Note

To summarize, it can be said that Aisha (R.A.) is one of exemplary personalities in Islamic history who have taught us how to be obedient and love-exchange partners as well as stick-to-values people even when the entire world stands against you. The best fact about her life is that she was an exemplary scholar in the jahiliyya era which shows that Islam has never been a misogynist religion and nor does it marginalize women in any area. Along with, it is because of her that we are aware of many of the inside house behavior and rituals of the Prophet ﷺ today. May Allah bless us to follow her footsteps and be in Jannāh with her: Ameen.

By Sirajuddin Shaikh