Mu'jam Kabir Tabarani 19443 — When the Messenger of Allah ﷺ intended

Sayyidah Aishah (may Allah be pleased with her) narrates: When the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) intended to set out on a journey, he would cast lots among his pure wives, and whichever of them had her name come out in the lot, he (peace and blessings be upon him) would take her with him. So in a military expedition that he (peace and blessings be upon him) undertook, lots were cast among us and my name came out, and after the command of the veil (hijab) had been revealed I set out with the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him). I would be placed in the howdah and set down in it. So we travelled on until, when the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) had finished that expedition and set off to return, and we drew near Madinah, the departure was announced one night. When the departure was announced, I got up and walked until I had gone beyond the army, and when I had finished my need and came back towards my howdah, I found that my necklace of Zafar beads had broken and fallen. I went back in search of my necklace, and that search held me back. Meanwhile, the people who used to lift my howdah came, lifted my howdah and loaded it onto the camel I used to ride, thinking that I was riding in it. In those days women were light; they did not become heavy with excess flesh, but ate only a little food. So when the people lifted the howdah, they were not surprised at its lightness, and I was still a young girl. So they drove the camel on and all set off. I found my necklace after the army had moved on, and then I came to their camp, but there was neither anyone calling nor anyone answering. So I went to the place where I had been before, thinking that the people would miss me and come back. While I was sitting in my place, sleep overcame me and I slept. Safwan bin al-Mu'attal al-Sulami (may Allah be pleased with him) had stayed behind the army; he travelled in the last part of the night and reached the vicinity of my place in the morning. He saw the shape of a person sleeping, and he recognised me as soon as he saw me, for he had seen me before the command of the veil was revealed. I woke at the sound of his saying "Inna lillahi wa inna ilayhi raji'un (We belong to Allah and to Him we return)", and I covered my face with my outer sheet. By Allah, he did not say a single word to me, nor did I hear any word from him, until he made his mount kneel and put his foot on its foreleg, and I mounted it. Then he set off ahead, leading the mount, until we reached the army, which had halted in the intense heat of midday. On this occasion, whoever of the slanderers was to be ruined was ruined, and the one who bore the greatest burden of this slander was Abdullah bin Ubayy bin Salul. Then we reached Madinah, and after reaching Madinah I was ill for a month. People were busy with the talk of the slanderers, but I knew nothing of it. However, it kept troubling me in my illness that I was not finding from the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) the gentleness and attention I usually saw during illness. He (peace and blessings be upon him) would only come in and say: "How is she?" and then leave. This troubled me, but I had no sense of the evil. Until, after recovering, Umm Mistah (may Allah be pleased with her) and I went out towards al-Manasi', which was our place for relieving ourselves. We would only go out at night. This was at the time when toilets were not built near houses, and our practice was like that of the early Arabs, going out into the open to relieve ourselves, and we found it distasteful to build toilets near our houses. When we had finished our need and were walking back towards my house, Umm Mistah tripped in her wrap and stumbled, and she said: "May Mistah perish!" I said: "What an evil thing you have said! Do you revile a man who took part in the battle of Badr?" She said: "O you! Do you not know what he has said?" I asked: "What has he said?" So she told me what the slanderers were saying, and my illness grew worse. When I returned home, the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) came to me and said: "How is she?" I said: "Will you permit me to go to my parents?" (At that time I wanted to investigate the matter fully with them.) The Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) gave me permission. I came to my parents and asked my mother: "Mother, what are people talking about?" She said: "Daughter, take it lightly. By Allah, it very rarely happens that a beautiful woman is with a husband who loves her, and she also has co-wives, without their talking about her." I said: "Subhan Allah! Have people really said this?" So I wept that night until morning; my tears did not stop and no sleep came to me. Then morning came, and still I kept weeping. When the revelation was delayed, the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) called Ali bin Abi Talib and Usamah bin Zayd (may Allah be pleased with them both) to consult them about separating from his wife. Usamah (may Allah be pleased with him) advised the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) in keeping with what he knew of the innocence of his wife and the love for them in his heart, and Usamah (may Allah be pleased with him) said: "O Messenger of Allah, she is your wife, and we know nothing about her but good." As for Ali bin Abi Talib (may Allah be pleased with him), he said: "O Messenger of Allah, Allah has not restricted you; there are many women besides her, and if you ask the slave girl, she will tell you the truth." So the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) called Barirah (may Allah be pleased with her) and said: "O Barirah, have you seen anything in Aishah that seems doubtful to you?" Barirah said: "No, by the One who sent you with the truth, I have not seen anything in her for which I would blame her, except that she is a young girl who falls asleep while kneading her family's dough, and the goat comes and eats it." So the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) stood up that same day and sought (people's) support against Abdullah bin Ubayy. He (peace and blessings be upon him) said on the pulpit: "O company of Muslims, who will excuse me regarding a man whose harm has reached my family? By Allah, I have known nothing in my family but good, and about the man they have mentioned I have also known nothing but good, and he never came to my family without me." At this, Sa'd bin Mu'adh (may Allah be pleased with him) stood up and said: "O Messenger of Allah, I will excuse you regarding him. If he is from al-Aws, I will strike off his head, and if he is from our brothers of al-Khazraj, you command us and we will act upon it." At this, Sa'd bin Ubadah (may Allah be pleased with him) stood up. He was the chief of al-Khazraj, and before that he had been a righteous man, but at that time tribal zeal stirred him up. He said to Sa'd bin Mu'adh: "You have lied! By Allah, you will not kill him, nor do you have the power to kill him." At this, Usayd bin Hudayr (may Allah be pleased with him), who was the cousin of Sa'd bin Mu'adh, stood up and said to Sa'd bin Ubadah: "You have lied! By Allah, we will certainly kill him; you are a hypocrite, arguing in support of the hypocrites." So both tribes, al-Aws and al-Khazraj, became enraged, until they were on the verge of fighting each other, while the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) was standing on the pulpit. He (peace and blessings be upon him) kept calming them until they all fell silent, and he (peace and blessings be upon him) too fell silent. That day I wept the whole day; my tears did not stop and no sleep came to me. My parents were with me, and I remained for two nights and a day in this state, with no sleep coming and my tears not stopping; I felt that the weeping would split my liver. The two of them were sitting with me and I was weeping when an Ansari woman asked permission to come in. I gave her permission, and she too began weeping with me. We were in this state when the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) came in and sat down, although he (peace and blessings be upon him) had not sat with me since this thing had been said, and a month had passed without any revelation coming down to him about me. When he (peace and blessings be upon him) sat down, he recited the tashahhud and then said: "To proceed: O Aishah, such and such has reached me about you. If you are innocent of it, Allah will soon declare you innocent; and if you have committed a sin, then seek Allah's forgiveness and turn to Him, for when a servant confesses a sin and then repents, Allah accepts his repentance." When the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) had finished speaking, my tears dried up so completely that I did not feel a single drop of them. I said to my father: "Answer the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) regarding what he has said." He said: "By Allah, I do not know what to say to the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him)." I said to my mother: "Answer the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him)." She too said: "By Allah, I do not know what to say to the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him)." So I said myself (and I was a young girl who had not read much of the Qur'an): "By Allah, I know that you people have heard this thing until it has become fixed in your hearts and you have believed it. Now if I tell you that I am innocent (and Allah knows that I am innocent), you will not believe me; and if I confess to you some sin (while Allah knows that I am innocent of it), you will believe me. By Allah, I find no example for me and for you except what the father of Yusuf (peace be upon him) said: 'So patience is best, and it is Allah whose help is sought against what you describe.'" Then I turned over and lay down on my bed. At that time I was certain that I was innocent and that Allah Almighty would make my innocence known. But by Allah, I did not think that Allah Almighty would send down about me any revelation that would be recited; I considered myself too insignificant for Allah Almighty to say anything about me that would be recited. Rather, I hoped that Allah Almighty would show His Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him) a vision in a dream through which he would make my innocence known. By Allah, the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) had not yet risen from his gathering, nor had any of the household gone out, when Allah Almighty sent down revelation upon him, and the state that used to come over him at the time of revelation came over him (peace and blessings be upon him), until sweat like pearls began to drip from him even on a winter day, because of the weight that the Qur'an bore upon him as it was sent down. Then, when that state passed from the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him), he (peace and blessings be upon him) was laughing, and the first words he (peace and blessings be upon him) spoke were: "O Aishah, Allah has declared you innocent." My mother said: "Get up and go to him." I said: "By Allah, I will not go to him, nor will I praise anyone but Allah." So Allah Almighty sent down these verses: "Indeed, those who brought the slander are a group from among you" (all ten verses). When Allah Almighty sent down these verses about my innocence, Abu Bakr (may Allah be pleased with him), who used to spend on Mistah because of his kinship and his poverty, said: "By Allah, I will never spend anything on Mistah again, after what he said about Aishah." At this Allah Almighty revealed this verse: "And let not those of virtue and means among you swear that they will not give to their relatives, the poor and those who emigrated in the cause of Allah; rather, let them pardon and overlook. Do you not wish that Allah should forgive you?" So Abu Bakr (may Allah be pleased with him) said: "Yes indeed, by Allah, I do wish that Allah should forgive me." So he resumed for Mistah the spending he used to make on him before, and said: "By Allah, I will never take it away from him now." Sayyidah Aishah (may Allah be pleased with her) said that the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) also asked Zaynab bint Jahsh (may Allah be pleased with her) about me; he (peace and blessings be upon him) said: "O Zaynab, what do you know and what have you seen?" Zaynab (may Allah be pleased with her) said: "I protect my hearing and my sight. By Allah, I have known nothing about her but good." And it was Zaynab who, among the wives of the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him), used to compete with me, but Allah Almighty protected her (from speaking falsely) because of her piety. Her sister Hamnah, however, began to fight for her sister's sake, and so she too was among those who were ruined because of the slander. Ibn Shihab (may Allah have mercy on him) said: This is the narration that has reached us from these narrators.