Sawda bint Zam'a: The Second Wife of the Prophet

Sawda bint Zam'a was a wife of Prophet Muhammad (Peace Be Upon Him) and one of the Mothers of the Believers (Ummahat al-Mu'minin), the designation the Qur'an gives to the Prophet's wives in declaring them as mothers to the believers (Qur'an 33:6). The classical biographical literature places her marriage to the Prophet after the death of Khadijah bint Khuwaylid and before Aisha bint Abu Bakr entered the household, making her the second woman he married. She had accepted Islam in Mecca in the early years of the mission and had emigrated to Abyssinia with her first husband, al-Sakran ibn Amr, whose death left her a widow.

Two episodes involving Sawda are recorded in Sahih al-Bukhari, and they are the firmest points in her biography. In the first, Umar ibn al-Khattab recognised her by her height when she went out at night, and the verse of hijab was revealed (Sahih al-Bukhari 6240). In the second, she gave her allotted day and night with the Prophet to Aisha (Sahih al-Bukhari 2593). A considerable body of later writing supplies detail about her life beyond these reports; where that material could not be traced to an authoritative early source, it is not carried here.

Family and First Marriage

The classical biographical works give her name as Sawda bint Zam'a ibn Qays ibn Abd Shams, of the Banu Amir ibn Lu'ayy, a clan of the Quraysh. Her year of birth is not recorded, and her age at any point in her life is not established.

Her first husband was al-Sakran ibn Amr, of the same broader clan grouping within the Quraysh. The biographical literature records a son, Abd al-Rahman, from this marriage.

Islam and the Migration to Abyssinia

Sawda and al-Sakran were among those who accepted Islam during the early Meccan years, when the community was small and under sustained pressure from the Quraysh. Both were among the Muslims who emigrated to Abyssinia, the Christian kingdom whose ruler granted them asylum and declined to hand them over to the delegation the Quraysh sent after them. This was the first emigration in Islamic history, undertaken some years before the migration to Medina.

Al-Sakran died after the return to Mecca, leaving Sawda a widow within a community that was itself a persecuted minority. The sources do not agree on when his death occurred, and no date is asserted here.

Marriage to the Prophet

Khadijah bint Khuwaylid died in Mecca around 619 CE, in the same period as the death of the Prophet's uncle Abu Talib, who had shielded him through the authority he held as chief of the Banu Hashim. The loss of both in close succession removed the Prophet's closest support within his household and his protection within the tribal system of Mecca.

The biographical literature reports that the marriage to Sawda was proposed by Khawla bint Hakim, a companion of the Prophet. The date of the marriage is not established. Sawda was the only wife in the Prophet's household from that point until the Prophet's marriage to Aisha was consummated in Medina, a period covering the closing years in Mecca and the migration itself.

The Verse of Hijab

Sahih al-Bukhari 6240 records a report from Aisha concerning the occasion on which the verse of hijab was revealed. The wives of the Prophet used to go out at night to relieve themselves. Umar ibn al-Khattab had urged the Prophet more than once to screen his wives, and the Prophet had not done so. One night Sawda went out, and because she was a tall woman Umar recognised her and called out that he had done so. The verse of hijab was then revealed.

The report is graded sahih. It establishes two things directly: that Sawda was of notably tall stature, and that she was the person involved in the incident the report connects with this revelation. In the hadith literature the phrase "the verse of hijab" refers to the directive in Surah al-Ahzab that believers address the Prophet's wives from behind a screen (Qur'an 33:53). A separate verse in the same chapter instructs the women of the Prophet's household to draw their outer garments about them when they go out (Qur'an 33:59); the report above concerns the first of these.

The regulations marked a change in the household's relationship to the wider community, drawing a firmer boundary between the Prophet's domestic quarters and the public life of Medina, where believers came in numbers for prayer, instruction, and judgment.

Her Allotted Day and Night Given to Aisha

Sahih al-Bukhari 2593 records that the Prophet apportioned to each of his wives a day and a night, and that Sawda gave up her day and night to Aisha, seeking by that act to please the Prophet.

A widely repeated account holds that Sawda made this arrangement because she feared being divorced in her old age, and that her purpose was to secure her standing as a wife of the Prophet in the hereafter. That motive does not appear in the sound report, which states only that she sought to please the Prophet. There is no authentic report that the Prophet divorced her or intended to do so. The stronger narration is followed here and the weaker version is not carried.

Legal Significance

Jurists cited this episode in discussing whether a wife may voluntarily give up part of her claim on her husband's time, and on what conditions such an arrangement holds — in particular that it be made freely and without coercion. The episode became a standard reference in the treatment of the equitable division of time in a polygynous marriage.

Commentators have connected Qur'an 4:128, which permits a settlement between spouses where a wife fears her husband's aversion, with arrangements of this kind. Whether that verse was revealed concerning Sawda specifically is not established by the sound material, and no such claim is made here.

After the Prophet's Death

The Qur'an prohibits marriage to the Prophet's wives after him (Qur'an 33:53). Sawda remained in Medina for the rest of her life, and like the other Mothers of the Believers she held a recognised standing in the community and was provided for from the public treasury. She is not associated in the sources with the political disputes of the period that followed.

The sources differ sharply on the year of her death, placing it either during the caliphate of Umar ibn al-Khattab or in 54 AH during the caliphate of Muawiyah — a difference of roughly thirty years. No figure is asserted here. She died and was buried in Medina.

Hadith Transmission

A small number of reports are transmitted from Sawda, concerning matters of worship and domestic practice. Her place in the hadith literature rests less on what she narrated than on what is narrated about her: the two reports above, both preserved in Sahih al-Bukhari, and the accounts of the apportioning of days among the Prophet's wives, in which she appears as a participant.

What the Early Sources Do Not Establish

A substantial body of writing about Sawda does not derive from the early material. A number of details are therefore not established, and are omitted here rather than presented with qualifying language. The sources do not record her year of birth, nor her age at her marriage, at the Prophet's death, or at her own death. The year of her marriage to the Prophet and the timing of al-Sakran's death are not fixed, and her own year of death is one on which the sources differ by about three decades. Her upbringing, education, and the circumstances of her first marriage are not established, and her appearance is not described beyond the reference to her height contained in Sahih al-Bukhari 6240. Her temperament and disposition, along with accounts of her humour, are widely repeated but could not be traced to an authoritative early source, as are reports that she worked and sold leather and accounts of her charitable giving. Her reasoning in ceding her day and night is not established beyond the motive stated in the sound report, and the character of her relations with her co-wives is a matter on which the early material does not report.

References and Further Reading

Primary Islamic Sources

• Qur'an, Surah al-Ahzab (33:6) — the Prophet's wives are as mothers to the believers, the basis of the title Umm al-Mu'minin
• Qur'an, Surah al-Ahzab (33:53) — the verse of screening, connected in Sahih al-Bukhari 6240 with the incident involving Sawda; also the prohibition of marriage to the Prophet's wives after him
• Qur'an, Surah al-Ahzab (33:59) — the directive concerning outer garments
• Qur'an, Surah al-Nisa (4:128) — settlement between spouses, cited by commentators in connection with arrangements of the kind Sawda made
• Sahih al-Bukhari 6240 — narrated from Aisha; Umar recognises Sawda at night and the verse of hijab is revealed. Graded sahih
• Sahih al-Bukhari 2593 — Sawda gives her allotted day and night to Aisha in order to please the Prophet. Graded sahih

Classical Islamic Sources

• Ibn Sa'd, Muhammad. Al-Tabaqat al-Kubra. Edited by Eduard Sachau. Leiden: Brill, 1904–1940. [Compiled c. 845 CE] — the principal early biographical notice
• Ibn Hisham. Al-Sirah al-Nabawiyyah. Edited by Mustafa al-Saqqa et al. Cairo: 1936. [Based on Ibn Ishaq, 8th century CE] — the lists of emigrants to Abyssinia
• Al-Tabari, Muhammad ibn Jarir. Tarikh al-Rusul wa al-Muluk. Edited by M.J. de Goeje. Leiden: Brill, 1879–1901. [Completed c. 915 CE]
• Ibn Abd al-Barr, Yusuf. Al-Isti'ab fi Ma'rifat al-Ashab. Cairo: Nahdat Misr, 1960. [Compiled c. 1070 CE]
• Al-Dhahabi, Shams al-Din. Siyar A'lam al-Nubala'. Beirut: Mu'assasat al-Risalah, 1981–1988. [Compiled c. 1348 CE]
• Ibn Hajar al-Asqalani. Al-Isabah fi Tamyiz al-Sahabah. Beirut: Dar al-Kutub al-Ilmiyyah, 1995. [Compiled c. 1449 CE] — notes the disagreement over the year of her death

Academic and Scholarly Sources

• Stowasser, Barbara Freyer. Women in the Qur'an, Traditions, and Interpretation. New York: Oxford University Press, 1994.
• Ahmed, Leila. Women and Gender in Islam: Historical Roots of a Modern Debate. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1992.
• Watt, W. Montgomery. Muhammad at Medina. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1956.
• Nadwi, Mohammad Akram. Al-Muhaddithat: The Women Scholars in Islam. Oxford: Interface Publications, 2007.
• Encyclopaedia of Islam, 3rd edition. Leiden: Brill — entries on the wives of the Prophet and on the Abyssinian emigration.

Further Reading

• Lings, Martin. Muhammad: His Life Based on the Earliest Sources. Cambridge: Islamic Texts Society, 1983.
• Abbott, Nabia. Aishah: The Beloved of Mohammed. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1942. — for the household context in Medina.
• al-Mubarakpuri, Safi-ur-Rahman. Ar-Raheeq Al-Makhtum (The Sealed Nectar). Riyadh: Darussalam, 1979.