Umm Salama: Counsel at Hudaybiyyah

Umm Salama, born Hind bint Abi Umayyah ibn al-Mughirah, was a wife of Prophet Muhammad (Peace Be Upon Him) and one of the Mothers of the Believers. She belonged to the clan of Makhzum, among the most powerful in Quraysh, and she is the only one of the Prophet's wives to have migrated both to Abyssinia and to Medina.

She is remembered above all for a single intervention. At the conclusion of the Treaty of Hudaybiyyah, when the Companions were reluctant to comply with terms they found humiliating, it was her counsel that resolved the impasse. The episode is preserved in Sahih al-Bukhari.

Family and First Marriage

Her father, Abu Umayyah ibn al-Mughirah, was known by the epithet Zad al-Rakib, the traveller's provision, in reference to his practice of provisioning those who travelled with him. The Makhzum were among the leading clans of Mecca and among the most hostile to the Prophet's message.

The early sources record nothing substantial of her childhood, and none is supplied here.

She married her cousin Abdullah ibn Abd al-Asad, known by his kunya Abu Salama. Both accepted Islam in the Meccan period, in the earliest years of the mission, and in doing so placed themselves in opposition to their own clan.

Migration to Abyssinia

As persecution in Mecca intensified, the Prophet directed a group of Muslims to seek refuge in Abyssinia, the Christian kingdom across the Red Sea. Umm Salama and Abu Salama were among them. This was the first migration in Islamic history, some years before the Hijra to Medina.

They later returned to Mecca, where the hostility of the Quraysh had not abated. The wider episode is treated in the article on the Meccan period.

Umm Salama and Abu Salama had four children: Salama, Umar, Zaynab and Durrah. From her eldest son came the kunya by which she is known.

The Separation and the Journey to Medina

The account of Umm Salama's migration to Medina is preserved in the Sirah of Ibn Ishaq, in the recension of Ibn Hisham, and it is among the more detailed narratives the early sources give of any woman of the period.

When Abu Salama set out for Medina with his wife and child, men of her own clan of Makhzum intervened and refused to allow her to leave with him. They took her back. Abu Salama's clan, the Banu Abd al-Asad, then demanded the child, and in the struggle between the two families over him the boy's arm was injured. The child went with his father's people, and Umm Salama was left in Mecca separated from both husband and son.

The separation lasted about a year. Ibn Ishaq's account describes her going out daily to al-Abtah, on the edge of the city, and weeping there. Eventually a man of her clan spoke on her behalf and the Makhzum permitted her to leave; Abu Salama's family then returned her son to her.

She set out for Medina with the child and no companion. On the way she met Uthman ibn Talha of the clan of Abd al-Dar, who was not then a Muslim. Learning where she was going, he escorted her the length of the journey, leading her camel and withdrawing to a distance when they halted, and brought her to Medina before turning back without accepting anything for it. Umm Salama's own testimony, transmitted in the same account, was that she had never met a more honourable man.

Marriage to the Prophet

The death of Abu Salama

Abu Salama was wounded at the Battle of Uhud in 3 AH. He recovered sufficiently to lead an expedition afterwards, but the wound reopened and he died in Medina in 4 AH.

A report transmitted from Umm Salama and preserved in Sahih Muslim, Kitab al-Jana'iz, records the supplication the Prophet taught for one afflicted by loss: that God reward the afflicted for the affliction and give a better replacement in its place. Umm Salama's own comment, in the same report, was that she said this and asked herself who could be better than Abu Salama. The report is graded sahih.

The proposal

The Prophet sent a proposal of marriage. The biographical literature records that Umm Salama raised concerns: that she was of an age, that she had young children, and that she was of a jealous disposition. The Prophet's answers to each are recorded in the same literature.

The marriage took place in 4 AH. Her children entered the household with her.

Hudaybiyyah

In 6 AH the Prophet travelled toward Mecca with a large body of Muslims intending to perform the pilgrimage. The Quraysh barred their entry, and after negotiation the Treaty of Hudaybiyyah was concluded. Its terms required the Muslims to turn back without performing the pilgrimage that year, and included provisions many of the Companions found difficult to accept.

The report in Sahih al-Bukhari, Kitab al-Shurut, records what followed. The Prophet instructed the Companions to slaughter their sacrificial animals and shave their heads, marking the end of the state of pilgrim consecration. They did not respond. He repeated the instruction; still no one moved. The disappointment in the camp was such that the command went unobeyed.

He then went to Umm Salama and told her what had happened. Her counsel was that he should go out himself, say nothing further to anyone, slaughter his own animal and call his barber to shave him. He did so. When the Companions saw it, they rose and did the same, and some began shaving one another so vigorously that it seemed they might come to harm.

The report is graded sahih. The episode is significant for two reasons. It is a documented instance of the Prophet acting on the counsel of one of his wives in a matter of communal consequence. And the reasoning behind the advice is practical and precise: not further instruction, but example.

Episodes Attested in Her House

Two further episodes involving Umm Salama are preserved in the collections with named chains, and both bear on questions wider than her own biography.

The first concerns the revelation of a Qur'anic verse. A report transmitted from Umm Salama and preserved in Jami' at-Tirmidhi records that she remarked to the Prophet that she had not heard God mention women in connection with the emigration, as the men had been mentioned. The verse then revealed was Surah Al Imran 3:195, in which God affirms that He will not let the work of any worker among them be lost, "whether male or female" (Quran 3:195). The report is graded hasan. Whatever the precise sequence, the tradition connects a woman's question with the occasion of a verse that states the equal standing of men and women before God in the reward for their deeds.

The second is the tradition known as the hadith of the cloak. Reports preserved in Jami' at-Tirmidhi place the event in Umm Salama's house: when the verse of purification was revealed — "God only wishes to remove impurity from you, O people of the household, and to purify you with a thorough purification" (Quran 33:33) — the Prophet gathered Fatimah, Ali, Hasan and Husayn beneath a cloak and prayed for them. In the version narrated from Umm Salama's stepson, Umar ibn Abi Salama, she asked whether she too was included, and was answered that she was in her place and upon good; a second version, narrated from Umm Salama herself, records the same exchange. Tirmidhi grades the first sahih and the second hasan. The reports are cited here for what they establish directly — that the event occurred in Umm Salama's house and that she is among its narrators. The wider question of the precise scope of the "people of the household" (ahl al-bayt) is a matter of long exegetical and theological discussion beyond the biography of Umm Salama, and is not resolved here.

Transmission of Hadith

Umm Salama transmitted a substantial body of hadith, and the classical counts place her among the more prolific women transmitters after Aisha. Her reports appear across the canonical collections and concern matters of worship, of household practice, and of the circumstances of particular events.

Her transmissions entered the legal literature. One example, preserved in Sunan Abi Dawud and graded sahih, records a woman asking her about the hem of a long garment that trails over unclean ground; Umm Salama reported the Prophet's ruling that the clean ground the garment subsequently passes over purifies it. The report is cited in the juristic discussion of the purity of clothing.

She lived long after the Prophet's death and was consulted on religious questions during that period.

Later Life and Death

Umm Salama lived through the caliphates of Abu Bakr, Umar, Uthman and Ali, and into the Umayyad period. She was the last of the Prophet's wives to die.

The sources differ on the year of her death, placing it between 59 and 62 AH, and no figure is asserted here. She was buried in al-Baqi cemetery in Medina.

Assessment

What is established

Umm Salama belonged to the Makhzum clan and married her cousin Abu Salama, with whom she accepted Islam early and migrated to Abyssinia. She was detained by her own clan when she attempted to follow her husband to Medina, separated from her son, and reached Medina about a year later under the escort of Uthman ibn Talha. Abu Salama was wounded at Uhud and died in 4 AH, and she married the Prophet in the same year. Her counsel at Hudaybiyyah resolved the impasse over compliance with the treaty, as recorded in Sahih al-Bukhari. The hadith of the cloak, in which the verse of purification (33:33) was revealed and the Prophet gathered Fatimah, Ali, Hasan and Husayn, is placed by the collections in her house, and she is among its named narrators. She transmitted a substantial body of hadith, some of which entered the legal literature, and she was the last of the Prophet's wives to die.

What is not established

Her birth year, and therefore her age at any point in her life. Her childhood and education, including any claim that she was literate. Which of her children was born in Abyssinia. Her feelings during the separation beyond what Ibn Ishaq's account records. Her relationships with the other wives. Her later view of Uthman ibn Talha's acceptance of Islam. The year of her death.

These are omitted. The material that remains includes one of the best documented episodes of counsel in the Prophet's biography, and a migration narrative of unusual detail for a woman of the period.

References and Further Reading

Primary Islamic Sources

• Qur'an, Surah al-Ahzab 33:6 — the wives of the Prophet in the position of mothers to the believers
• Qur'an, Surah al-Ahzab 33:33 — the verse of purification, revealed in connection with the hadith of the cloak in Umm Salama's house
• Qur'an, Surah Al Imran 3:195 — the reward of the worker "whether male or female," connected in tradition with Umm Salama's question
• Qur'an, Surah al-Fath 48 — revealed in connection with the Treaty of Hudaybiyyah and its outcome
• Sahih al-Bukhari, Kitab al-Shurut (Book of Conditions) — the report of the Companions' hesitation at Hudaybiyyah and Umm Salama's counsel; graded sahih
• Sahih Muslim, Kitab al-Jana'iz (Book of Funerals) — the supplication taught at the death of Abu Salama, transmitted from Umm Salama; graded sahih
• Jami' at-Tirmidhi 3023 — Umm Salama's question and the occasion of Qur'an 3:195; graded hasan
• Jami' at-Tirmidhi 3205 (graded sahih) and 3871 (graded hasan) — the hadith of the cloak in her house, with her question and the reply
• Sunan Abi Dawud 383 — Umm Salama's transmission on the purity of a trailing garment; graded sahih

Classical Islamic Sources

• Ibn Hisham. Al-Sirah al-Nabawiyyah, recension of the Sirah of Ibn Ishaq. Edited by Mustafa al-Saqqa et al. Cairo: Mustafa al-Babi al-Halabi, 1955. — the detention at Mecca, the separation from her son, and the journey to Medina with Uthman ibn Talha
• Ibn Sa'd, Muhammad. Kitab al-Tabaqat al-Kubra. Vol. 8, the women. Edited by Eduard Sachau. Leiden: Brill, 1904–1940. [Compiled c. 845 CE] — the principal early biography, including the proposal of marriage
• Ibn Hajar al-Asqalani. Fath al-Bari bi-Sharh Sahih al-Bukhari. Cairo: al-Matba'ah al-Salafiyyah — commentary on the Hudaybiyyah report
• Ibn Hajar al-Asqalani. Al-Isabah fi Tamyiz al-Sahabah. Beirut: Dar al-Kutub al-Ilmiyyah, 1995. [Compiled c. 1449 CE]
• Al-Dhahabi, Shams al-Din. Siyar A'lam al-Nubala'. Beirut: Mu'assasat al-Risalah, 1981–1988. [Compiled c. 1348 CE]
• Ibn Abd al-Barr, Yusuf. Al-Isti'ab fi Ma'rifat al-Ashab. Cairo: Nahdat Misr, 1960. [Compiled c. 1070 CE]

Academic and Scholarly Sources

• Watt, W. Montgomery. Muhammad at Medina. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1956. — the Treaty of Hudaybiyyah and its terms
• Sayeed, Asma. Women and the Transmission of Religious Knowledge in Islam. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013.
• Stowasser, Barbara Freyer. Women in the Qur'an, Traditions, and Interpretation. New York: Oxford University Press, 1994.
• Raven, Wim. "Some Early Islamic Texts on the Negus of Abyssinia." Journal of Semitic Studies 33, no. 2 (1988): 197–218.
• Robinson, Chase F. Islamic Historiography. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003.

Further Reading

• Lings, Martin. Muhammad: His Life Based on the Earliest Sources. Cambridge: Islamic Texts Society, 1983.
• Bewley, Aisha, trans. The Women of Madina (from Ibn Sa'd's Kitab al-Tabaqat al-Kubra). London: Ta-Ha Publishers, 1995.
• Nadwi, Mohammad Akram. Al-Muhaddithat: The Women Scholars in Islam. Oxford: Interface Publications, 2007.
• Encyclopaedia of Islam, 3rd edition. Leiden: Brill — entry on Umm Salama