Khadijah

Khadijah
By: Dr Mohammad Akram Nadwi
Oxford
She is the first human being to whom the Prophet announced his prophethood. The fact that he does this, the way she responds and his response to her tell us something very important about the character of this marriage, which is missing from some of the later marriages. In a modern idiom this kind of marriage is called a compassionate marriage, which is distinguished from a marriage of convenience. In such a marriage, there is sufficient trust between the couple to reveal all that is in the heart of each, including revealing ones fears and vulnerabilities.

The second thing it reveals about Khadijah is her strength as a person, her good sense and command of the situation. Fist she covers him to comfort him, then she reassures him that he will not be deceived because she knows how good a man he is; she does not pretend to have knowledge and competence to make any judgement about the incident reported by her husband except on the basis of his excellent character. Finally she goes with him to one who does have the knowledge to make such a judgement.

She has spiritual integrity and courage to believe that the reported incident is a true report of true revelation from God, which places an immense burden of responsibility on those who genuinely believe it to be so.

She was the mother of his children and his companion for 25 years. She had been his employer and trusted her goods to him, and having proved him it was she who initiated the marriage. It is of the utmost importance for the attitude towards women to grasp that a woman is not, because she is a woman, limited in her wisdom and good judgement, her power to act in the world, and more importantly she in not limited because she is a woman, in the quality of her spiritual and moral courage.