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Muhammad decreed that the women could only mourn their relatives (other than a husband) for three days. After the three days were over, Zaynab received a condolence visit from the daughter of her cousin Abu Salama.<ref>Abu Salama and Zaynab were the offspring of two sisters. His daughter, also named Zaynab, would have been about nine years old and was perhaps reporting on the health of her father, who had been wounded at Uhud.</ref> In front of her guest, Zaynab made a show of asking for perfume and anointing herself, then explaining that she did not really want the perfume but that she was officially out of mourning.<ref>{{Abudawud|2|2292}}. The ''hadith'' does not state which one of Zaynab’s brothers had just died. However, it cannot have been Abu Ahmad, who outlived her; and it is unlikely that she was much distressed by the death of Ubaydullah, whom the family had disowned and whom, by the time of his death, she had not seen for twelve years. So it almost certainly refers to the death of Abdullah at Uhud.</ref> The prohibition on displays of grief must have been hard for the bereaved mothers, sisters and daughters. The specific loss for Zaynab, however, was that her brother Abdullah had been willing to support her against Muhammad’s wishes; now she had lost her protector just as she found herself married to a man whom she disliked. | Muhammad decreed that the women could only mourn their relatives (other than a husband) for three days. After the three days were over, Zaynab received a condolence visit from the daughter of her cousin Abu Salama.<ref>Abu Salama and Zaynab were the offspring of two sisters. His daughter, also named Zaynab, would have been about nine years old and was perhaps reporting on the health of her father, who had been wounded at Uhud.</ref> In front of her guest, Zaynab made a show of asking for perfume and anointing herself, then explaining that she did not really want the perfume but that she was officially out of mourning.<ref>{{Abudawud|2|2292}}. The ''hadith'' does not state which one of Zaynab’s brothers had just died. However, it cannot have been Abu Ahmad, who outlived her; and it is unlikely that she was much distressed by the death of Ubaydullah, whom the family had disowned and whom, by the time of his death, she had not seen for twelve years. So it almost certainly refers to the death of Abdullah at Uhud.</ref> The prohibition on displays of grief must have been hard for the bereaved mothers, sisters and daughters. The specific loss for Zaynab, however, was that her brother Abdullah had been willing to support her against Muhammad’s wishes; now she had lost her protector just as she found herself married to a man whom she disliked. | ||
It is sometimes claimed that the defeat at Uhud created a great social problem because there were so many widows to support. It is even claimed that the excess of widows was the reason why polygamy became necessary.<ref></ref> However, of the seventy Muslims who were killed, sixty-six were from Medina and only four were Meccan immigrants.<ref></ref> The community was accustomed to losing men to the tribal wars<ref></ref> and there was already a system in place to ensure the rights of widows, largely based on the assumption that most families owned some farmland.<ref></ref> Muhammad did have to adjudicate a few civil cases in which widows or orphans were being cheated by their relatives;<ref></ref> and perhaps a few of the poorest families had to join the beggars on the mosque Bench.<ref></ref> But there is no evidence at all that Medina was suddenly swamped by | It is sometimes claimed that the defeat at Uhud created a great social problem because there were so many widows to support. It is even claimed that the excess of widows was the reason why polygamy became necessary.<ref></ref> However, of the seventy Muslims who were killed, sixty-six were from Medina and only four were Meccan immigrants.<ref></ref> The community was accustomed to losing men to the tribal wars<ref></ref> and there was already a system in place to ensure the rights of widows, largely based on the assumption that most families owned some farmland.<ref></ref> Muhammad did have to adjudicate a few civil cases in which widows or orphans were being cheated by their relatives;<ref></ref> and perhaps a few of the poorest families had to join the beggars on the mosque Bench.<ref></ref> But there is no evidence at all that Medina was suddenly swamped by desperate widows; it is even claimed that only thirty of the dead men had been married,<ref></ref> suggesting that the city would also have had several surviving bachelors. The real problem for Muhammad was that his hosts in Medina had taken a great hit on his behalf and he was at risk of losing their sympathy. This would have bothered him far more than the issue of the widows.<ref></ref> | ||
Hamnah had barely completed her ''idda'' before she was remarried to Talhah ibn Ubaydullah, a wealthy<ref></ref> thirty-year-old<ref></ref> bachelor who was kin to Abu Bakr.<ref> | Among the emigrants, there had always been more men than women,<ref></ref> and the addition of four new widows could not have done very much to redress the gender imbalance. However, it meant that some of the bachelors now had a chance to find a wife. Hamnah had barely completed her ''idda'' before she was remarried to Talhah ibn Ubaydullah,<ref>Bewley/Saad 8:170.</ref> a wealthy<ref></ref> thirty-year-old<ref></ref> bachelor who was kin to Abu Bakr.<ref></ref> Although he later became a polygamist, Hamnah was his only wife for several years.<ref></ref> Hamza’s widow appears to have returned to Mecca, where she found a new husband.<ref>Bewley/Saad 8:199.</ref> But Abdullah’s widow never remarried; she had a bleeding disorder that raised doubts about her ritual cleanness, i.e., availability for sex.<ref>Bewley/Saad 8:173. Fatima bint Abi Hubaysh and her sister-in-law Habibah bint Jahsh appear to have suffered from a similar disorder.</ref> | ||
===Third Marriage=== | ===Third Marriage=== | ||
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''When you said to him whom Allah had blessed and you had favoured, ‘Keep your wife to yourself, and fear Allah,’ and you were concealing within yourself what Allah should reveal, fearing other men; and Allah has better right for you to fear him. So when Zayd had accomplished what he would of her, then We gave her in marriage to you, so that there should not be any fault in the believers, touching the wives of their adopted sons, when they have accomplished what they would of them; and Allah’s commandment must be performed. There is no fault in the prophet, touching what Allah had ordained for him.”<ref>{{Quran-range|33|36-38}}.</ref> | ''When you said to him whom Allah had blessed and you had favoured, ‘Keep your wife to yourself, and fear Allah,’ and you were concealing within yourself what Allah should reveal, fearing other men; and Allah has better right for you to fear him. So when Zayd had accomplished what he would of her, then We gave her in marriage to you, so that there should not be any fault in the believers, touching the wives of their adopted sons, when they have accomplished what they would of them; and Allah’s commandment must be performed. There is no fault in the prophet, touching what Allah had ordained for him.”<ref>{{Quran-range|33|36-38}}.</ref> | ||
{{Quote|[http://www.a2youth.com/ebooks/the_wives_of_the_prophet/zainab_bint_jahash/ Thompson, A. (DATE). “Zainab bint Jahash” in ''The Wives of the Prophet''. London: Ta-Ha Publishers.|The marriage, however, was not a success. Although both Zaynab and Zayd were the best of people, who loved Allah and His Messenger, they were very different and in the end they could not overcome their incompatibility. Zayd asked the Prophet’s permission to divorce Zaynab more than once, and although he was counselled to hold onto his wife and to fear Allah, in the end the divorce took place. The Prophet then was ordered by Allah to marry Zaynab bint Jahsh, while he did in 5 AH, when he was 58 years old, and she was 35 years old. In doing so, he demonstrated beyond doubt that in Islam an adopted son is not regarded in the same light as a natural son, and that although a father may never marry a woman whom his natural son has married and then divorced, the father of an adopted son is permitted to marry a woman who was once, but is no longer, married to that adopted son. Furthermore, by marrying Zaynab, the Prophet also confirmed that it is permissible for cousins to marry, and , at the same time, Zaynab was given her heart’s desire to be married to the Best of Creation.}} | {{Quote|[http://www.a2youth.com/ebooks/the_wives_of_the_prophet/zainab_bint_jahash/ Thompson, A. (DATE). “Zainab bint Jahash” in ''The Wives of the Prophet''. London: Ta-Ha Publishers.|The marriage, however, was not a success. Although both Zaynab and Zayd were the best of people, who loved Allah and His Messenger, they were very different and in the end they could not overcome their incompatibility. Zayd asked the Prophet’s permission to divorce Zaynab more than once, and although he was counselled to hold onto his wife and to fear Allah, in the end the divorce took place. The Prophet then was ordered by Allah to marry Zaynab bint Jahsh, while he did in 5 AH, when he was 58 years old, and she was 35 years old. In doing so, he demonstrated beyond doubt that in Islam an adopted son is not regarded in the same light as a natural son, and that although a father may never marry a woman whom his natural son has married and then divorced, the father of an adopted son is permitted to marry a woman who was once, but is no longer, married to that adopted son. Furthermore, by marrying Zaynab, the Prophet also confirmed that it is permissible for cousins to marry, and , at the same time, Zaynab was given her heart’s desire to be married to the Best of Creation.}} | ||
===See Also=== | ===See Also=== | ||