Zaynab bint Khuzayma: Mother of the Poor

Zaynab bint Khuzayma ibn al-Harith 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 the Prophet's wives (Qur'an 33:6). She is known in the sources by the epithet Umm al-Masakin, the Mother of the Poor, given to her for her giving to the destitute.

Her marriage to the Prophet was the shortest of any of his wives. It was contracted in 3 AH and she died within months, in Medina. She and Khadijah bint Khuwaylid were the only two of the Prophet's wives to die during his lifetime.

Because the marriage was so brief, the early biographical literature records less about her than about any other Mother of the Believers. Her entry in the major works is confined to her lineage, her epithet, her marriage, and her death. A good deal of later writing extends beyond that, and where it cannot be traced to an authoritative early source it is not carried here.

Lineage

Zaynab belonged to the Banu Hilal, a division of the Banu Amir ibn Sa'sa'a of central Arabia, outside the Quraysh. Her father was Khuzayma ibn al-Harith. Her mother is given as Hind bint Awf, who was also the mother of Maymuna bint al-Harith, a later wife of the Prophet; the two were therefore sisters through their mother. The sources differ on whether they shared a father, and that question is left open here.

Her year of birth is not recorded, and her age at any point in her life is not established.

The Epithet Umm al-Masakin

Masakin denotes the destitute — those without the means to provide for themselves. The epithet Umm al-Masakin is applied to Zaynab consistently across the classical biographical works, and the sources indicate that it was attached to her before her marriage to the Prophet rather than conferred afterwards.

What the sources do not supply is detail: no specific acts of giving are recorded, no amounts, no named beneficiaries, and no account of the circumstances in which the name came to be used. The epithet is the substance of what survives about her character, and it is reported here as that and not expanded into a narrative.

The care of the poor is a recurring obligation in the Qur'an, which names the needy, the orphan, and the captive among those with a claim on the believer's wealth (Qur'an 76:8-9). Zaynab's epithet places her within that framework. The verse is cited here as the Qur'anic theme the epithet invokes, not as a passage revealed concerning her.

Previous Marriage

The sources do not agree on whom Zaynab was married to before the Prophet, and two identifications appear. One names Ubayda ibn al-Harith ibn Abd al-Muttalib, a cousin of the Prophet, who was mortally wounded in single combat at the Battle of Badr in 2 AH. The other names Abdullah ibn Jahsh, a cousin of the Prophet and brother of Zaynab bint Jahsh, who was killed at the Battle of Uhud in 3 AH.

Some later scholars proposed that she was married to both in succession. The identification is not settled, and no version is asserted here. It follows that the manner in which her earlier marriage ended is also not established.

Marriage to the Prophet

The marriage is commonly placed in Ramadan of 3 AH. The sources differ on how long it lasted, giving figures from two or three months up to about eight. No figure is asserted here beyond the fact that it was a matter of months.

The amount of the dowry is not established. The marriage produced no children.

Death and Burial

Zaynab died in Medina in 3 or 4 AH. The cause is not recorded. The biographical literature reports that the Prophet performed her funeral prayer and that she was buried in the cemetery of al-Baqi in Medina.

Her standing as a Mother of the Believers is not affected by the brevity of the marriage. The Qur'anic designation in 33:6 applies to the Prophet's wives without reference to duration, and she appears in all the standard lists of them.

What the Early Sources Do Not Establish

A number of matters are not established by the early record, and they are omitted rather than presented with qualifying language. Her year of birth is unknown, as is her age at her marriage or at her death. The identity of her previous husband, and how that marriage ended, is unsettled, and the date at which she accepted Islam is not recorded. Her life before the marriage, beyond the epithet itself, is not described, and no specific act of charity survives, nor any account of the origin of the epithet in a particular incident. The exact duration of the marriage and the exact date of her death are not fixed, and the cause of her death is not recorded. The early material does not report on her temperament, appearance, or daily life, and no hadith is transmitted from her, the brevity of the marriage having left no body of narration.

References and Further Reading

Primary Islamic Sources

The primary material naming Zaynab bint Khuzayma is limited, and the entries below reflect that rather than being extended with passages that do not concern her.

• 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-Insan (76:8-9) — the needy, the orphan, and the captive as those with a claim on the believer's wealth; the Qur'anic theme invoked by her epithet, not a passage revealed concerning her
• Qur'an, Surah al-Baqarah (2:177) — the giving of wealth to kin, orphans, and the needy as a constituent of faith
• The biographical notices listed below under Classical Islamic Sources are the primary record for her life; no hadith is transmitted from her

Classical Islamic Sources

• Ibn Sa'd, Muhammad. Al-Tabaqat al-Kubra. Edited by Eduard Sachau. Leiden: Brill, 1904–1940. [Compiled c. 845 CE] — the earliest surviving biographical notice, and the family of Hind bint Awf
• Ibn Hisham. Al-Sirah al-Nabawiyyah. Edited by Mustafa al-Saqqa et al. Cairo: 1936. [Based on Ibn Ishaq, 8th century CE] — Badr and Uhud, and the casualties named among her possible husbands
• 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] — records the divergence over her previous marriage

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. — Badr, Uhud, and the Medinan community in 3 AH
• 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 Banu Amir ibn Sa'sa'a.

Further Reading

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