Ages of Muhammads Wives at Marriage: Difference between revisions

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Amrah’s age is not extant in any sources surveyed for this study. However, the age of her first husband is, however, recorded. He was Muhammad’s cousin, Al-Fadl ibn Abbas.<ref>Ibn Ishaq, cited in Guillaume, A. (1960). ''New Light on the Life of Muhammad'', p. 55. Manchester: Manchester University Press.</ref> Al-Fadl’s brother Abdullah recalled: “We reached Allah’s Apostle five years after he had made ''Hijra'' and were with the Quraysh when they marched during the year in which the Battle of ''Ahzab'' [Trench] was fought [627]. I was with my brother Fadl … I was then eight years old while my brother was 13.”<ref>Tabrani/Haythami vol. 6 p. 64 reported on the chain of narrators for this hadith. Cited in Khandhlawi, M. M. Y. (1959). ''Hayatus Sahaba''. Translated by Elias, A. H. (2008). ''The Lives of the Sahabah'', vol. 1, p. 373. Farid Book Depot (Pvt.) Ltd.</ref>

It is a little strange that such a young man would so soon afterwards take on a second wife, but it is seems that he did so willingly, for Amrah was of no political importance. There is no obvious reason for this marriage beyond the documented fact that Al-Fadl was susceptible to pretty girls.<ref>See {{Bukhari|74|247}}.</ref> He was also said to be the eldest son of a very wealthy man,<ref>Guillaume/Ishaq 113, 114, 309-310.</ref> so if he wanted a second wife, there was nothing to stop him taking one. It is therefore highly unlikely that Amrah was plain or that she was older than Al-Fadl. She would have been the same age as her bridegroom or a little younger.

*Amrah’s Probable Age = about 15 years, give or take 5 years.

*Age Difference = around 45 years and 5 months.

There is alot of guesswork that went into this estimation, but it is an estimate based on real data about Amrah’s life. No data remains extant for the remainder of Muhammad's wives.  

Muhammad had other marriage contracts with several other women, but most of these unions were dissolved before consummation and thus were not true marriages according to Islamic law. The other women with whom he is known to have had a sexual relationship are the five listed below, four of whom were technically concubines (sex [[Slavery|slaves]]) rather than legal wives. The ages of these five women are unknown.

Mariyah’s age is not stated anywhere. The only certain fact is that, since she bore Muhammad a son in 630, she must have been of childbearing age.<ref>{{Tabari|9|pp. 39, 137}}.</ref> Various guesses that she was 20<ref>[http://www.a2youth.com/ebooks/the_wives_of_the_prophet/Maymunah_bint_al-harith/ Thomson, H. A. (1993). “Maymunah bint Al-Harith”] in ''The Wives of the Prophet Muhammad''. London: Ta-Ha Publishers Ltd.</ref> or 17<ref>[http://www.themodernreligion.com/prophet/prophet_aisha.htm/ Ahmed, S. “Prophet Muhammad and Aisha Siddiqa.”]</ref> betray the assumptions of the secondary historians that if she attracted Muhammad, she must have been young. Given the other evidence this is likely correct, but there is no data to support this conclusion.

The only objective clue to Fatima’s age is that she lived another 50 years after Muhammad divorced her.<ref>Bewley/Saad 8:100</ref> Subjectively, her behaviour seems immature and suited to a child aged 15 or 16.<ref>{{Tabari|39|pp. 187-188}}; Bewley/Saad 8:101.</ref> There is not any concrete data for calculation of her age though.

These two concubines were presumably selected for their looks and were presumably young. But presumption is not fact. There ages are unknown and there is not available data for calculation.

Based on the above sources the calculations of the ages of Muhammad's wives at marriage (including the various estimations above) are as follows:

The mean age of Muhammad’s brides was about ''24½ years''. To call such a woman middle-aged, even in Arabia at the time, seems uncalled for. Rather it appears that (like most rules of his stature) Muhammad preferred younger women.  

Based on the above data, it is also possible to calculate Muhammad's age as a bridgegroom in each other cases mentioned above. Here is his age when he consummated each of these marriages.

Muhammad’s first marriage to Khadijah skews the the mean. According to the traditional sources, she was the ''only'' wife whom Muhammad married as a young man. She was the ''only'' wife who was close to his own age, as opposed to being significantly younger. Some statisticians would exclude her as an outlier before they began the calculation.

Muhammad acquired these five women in the last five years of his life, so his mean age as bridegroom has to be raised. While we don’t know all of his wedding dates or the dates where he first sexually assaulted his slaves, the new figure would probably come to about 55 years – making the age difference between Muhammad and his “average wife” a grand mean of 33 years.

It should thus be kept in mind that the calculation that Muhammad’s average wife was 29 years younger than himself and that she became his bride when she was 24½ should be seen as conservative, and under representing both the age gap and the youth of Muhammad's female lover in each case.