Is it true that Prophet Muhammad married Aisha when she was only six years old?

Answer 1

Answer 1

According to some people who claim the Bukari and Muslim hadith reporting Hazrat Aisha's age are "weak" (I won't call them weak hadits, in reality they are attack on our Prophet PBUH.) There is material from both these hadith writers and earlier Islamic histories suggesting Aisha must have been older than nine when married.

• According to hadith in Bukhari and Muslim, Aisha is said to have joined Muhammad on the raid that culminated in the Battle of Badr, in 624 CE. However, because no one below the age of fifteen was allowed to accompany raiding parties, Aisha should have been at least fifteen in 624 CE and thus at least thirteen when she was married following the Hijra in 622 CE.

• Ibn Hisham's recension of Ibn Ishaq's Sirat Rashul Allah, the earliest surviving biography of Muhammad, records Aisha as having converted to Islam before Umar ibn al-Khattab, during the first few years of Islam around 610 CE. In order to accept Islam she must have been walking and talking, hence at least three years of age, which would make her at least fifteen in 622 CE.

Answer 2

Muhammed married a six year old girl when he was in his fifties. Her name was Aisha and she is reportedly the favourite of the Prophets wives. She was the daughter of his friend Abu Bakr. The marriage was consumated when she was nine years old.

This story is not in the Quran however, but is in the Ahadith, which are the recorded stories of the prophet, which Sunni Muslims consider authentic as examples of the Prophets behaviour and Character.

In Islam, the Prophet is considered the perfect man. This is also why the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini lowered the marriage age to Nine years old after the revolution in Iran.

Answer 3

The simple answer is no. However the answer is more complex than it might look on the surface.

One of Muhammad's wives was Ayesha or Aisha. Depending on what sources are used her age at marriage is sometimes put at 6 and consummation at 9. However there are a number of facts which need to be factored in.

1: Not all sources agree with Bukhari about Ayesha's age, Bukhari's Hadith were not collated until 300-odd years after Muhammad's death. Other sources give Ayesha's age as being 16 at marriage and 19 at consummation.

2: Even if her age were 6 / 9, the custom of taking child brides was a part of Middle-Eastern culture. The Jews practised it as well as many of the other nations in the Middle-East and remember too that Mary of Nazareth's age was probably around the 12-14 mark.

3: Customs and Traditions as well as laws were very different then from now. What is considered unacceptable now was not considered anything to comment about then.

Answer 4

Muhammad married his employer - who was forty years old - when he was twenty five. What's wrong with that? He loved her so much. She was his only wife - at a time when men could marry more than one - for the next twenty-five years. That means that he remained with her - a woman fifteen years his senior - until the age of fifty. FIFTY. Khadeejah died at the age of sixty-five. Muhammad was heartbroken.

As the head of the Islamic nation, it was part of his role to establish connections with other tribes. Muhammad, after the death of the woman he always loved more than any, married from various tribes. Most of the women he married were not young at all. Some were the widows of close companions. He was taking care of them. You must rise above Western culture which always equates marriage with sex.

Aisha, the youngest, was the daughter of his closest companion - Abu bakr - who would become the first person to lead the Islamic state after Muhammad. She was nine when the contract was written. She was thirteen when consummated. She was also loved dearly by Muhammad, and she, Aisha, became the one who gave us more of Muhammad's teachings than any other companion. She was a great scholar of Islam. Now, Muhammad married her by way of cementing the relationship between he and Aisha and he and her father. That is what marriage meant to the Arabs. And if it happens to be that such a marriage was looked upon as acceptable at that time and place, then where do we get off passing judgment based upon our time and place? Our norms? You want to talk about looking at the fruits? Read the life of Muhammad.

Peace and blessings be upon him, upon Jesus, and upon all of God's Prophets.

Answer 5

First, the dates.

• Aisha was born "at the beginning of the fourth year of prophethood" (Ibn Saad, Tabaqat, volume 8; p. 55 of Bewley's translation). That year began on 25 October 613, so Aisha was born within a few weeks of that date.
• Aisha was legally married to Muhammad "in the tenth year in Shawwal, when she was six" (ibid), which was May or June 620 CE.
• The date of the consummation was "in Shawwal on the eighth month of Hijra, and I was nine at the time" (ibid, p. 43). This was April or May 623 CE.

There are many other sources that say exactly the same thing, but it would be boring to list all of them.

The first writer seems to have read the arguments of an internet blogger styled "The Learner" without reading Shaykh Gibril Haddad's answers to these points.

• Aisha was not present at the Battle of Badr in 624. She did, however, attend the Battle of Uhud in 625. We know this from the eye-witness of Anas ibn Malik, who was standing so close to her that he could see her anklets while she brought water for the soldiers (Bukhari 4:52:131). However, Anas himself was only 13 years old, so the age-limit of 15 did not apply to whatever they were doing together. We know from other sources (Tabari vol. 12 pp. 27, 127, 146) that Muslim children were sent to the battle-field to apply first aid, dig graves and finish off the enemy wounded. Conclusion: in 625 Aisha was old enough to carry a water-jug.
• Ibn Hisham's recension of Ibn Ishaq's Sirat Rasul Allah was translated into English by Alfred Guillaume in 1955. It is now out of copyright and available for free on the internet. The list of the early converts appears on pages 115-117. Aisha's name is on the list. However, Aisha was considered a Muslim from the day she was born, so this does not prove she was "walking and talking." It only proves she had been born. While the list may not be not in strict chronological order (names seem to be arranged in family groups) probably all fifty of the people in this list were converted before Umar. His conversion is described on pp. 155ff and, to judge from other dates in the narrative, was in the year 616. Conclusion: Aisha was born in or before 616.

The third writer refers to "other sources" that give Aisha's age at 16 or 19. But this is only convincing if we know something about the sources. It is no good pleading that someone in The Daily Star said last week that she was 19. Only genuine Islamic traditions leading back to someone who knew Aisha personally have any authority. So far, no tradition from anyone who knew Aisha has disagreed with Bukhari. One or two traditions say she might have been 7 at the time of the legal marriage and 10 at the consummation, but the vast majority say she was 6 and 9. Nobody before 1923 ever said anything else.

In 1923 a Pakistani named Maulana Muhammad Ali wrote a book called Muhammad the Prophet in which he tried to argue that Aisha was 10 at the time of the legal contract and 15 at the consummation. Ali wasn't a professional historian; he wasn't even good at arithmetic. In fact, his section on the wives of Muhammad is incorrect or misleading on nearly every point. Nevertheless, people who want to believe that "Aisha was older" tend to follow Ali, including his faulty arithmetic.

It actually doesn't matter whether it was a "custom" to take child-brides. The question only asks whether or not Muhammad married a six-year-old, not whether he was right or wrong to do so. It probably is true that many people in many cultures did this. If Muhammad did it too, that simply proves he was a product of his culture (rather than the shaper of culture that he claimed to be). However, the Jews were one group who did not practise child-marriage. By Talmudic times, the minimum age for a girl to marry was 12½, and even then, it was only allowed if she had also begun to menstruate. The only primary source for the life of Mary of Nazareth is the New Testament, which does not mention her age, so we do not know how old Mary was. It does mention, however, that her husband Joseph was a "righteous" man. It would not have said this if he had broken the rules and tried to marry an under-age girl. The Jews also disliked a wide age-difference between spouses. They recommended that a man marry before he was 20.

The fourth writer seems to be arguing that because (1) Muhammad's first marriage was happy, and (2) his other 17 wives were "not young at all" but that (3) he was "taking care of his friends' widows," and that (4) his marriage to Aisha had a political motive and (5) she eventually became a teacher of Islam … this makes it acceptable that he married a 6-year-old and consummated the marriage when she was 9. But no matter what his reason for marrying her - whether it was lust or some other reason - this does not change her age. Her marriage was consummated when she was 9, and even if it was not consummated out of lust, it was still consummated.

Actually I think the majority of cultures have always agreed that it is wrong for an adult to engage in sexual activity with a prepubescent child. People who criticise Muhammad for doing this are probably not specifically judging by the standards of the modern West but by the common standards that have been recognised in most civilisations throughout history. But once again - the question does not ask for commentary on what was right or wrong. It only asks: "What happened?"

Answer 2

Source Material:Sahih Bukhari

Volume 7, Book 62, Number 64:

Narrated by 'AishaThat the Prophet married her when she was six years old and he consummated his marriage when she was nine years old, and then she remained with him for nine years (i.e., till his death).

Volume 7, Book 62, Number 65:

Narrated by 'Aisha

That the Prophet married her when she was six years old and he consummated his marriage when she was nine years old, Hisham said: I have been informed that 'Aisha remained with the Prophet for nine years (i.e. till his death)." What you know of the Quran (by heart)' Volume 7, Book 62, Number 88:

Narrated by 'Ursa

The Prophet wrote the (marriage contract) with 'Aisha while she was six years old and consummated his marriage with her while she was nine years old and she remained with him for nine years (i.e. till his death). Volume 5, Book 58, Number 234:

Narrated by 'Aisha

The Prophet engaged me when I was a girl of six (years). We went to Medina and stayed at the home of Bani-al-Harith bin Khazraj. Then I got ill and my hair fell down. Later on my hair grew (again) and my mother, Um Ruman, came to me while I was playing in a swing with some of my girl friends. She called me, and I went to her, not knowing what she wanted to do to me. She caught me by the hand and made me stand at the door of the house. I was breathless then, and when my breathing became Allright, she took some water and rubbed my face and head with it. Then she took me into the house. There in the house I saw some Ansari women who said, "Best wishes and Allah's Blessing and a good luck." Then she entrusted me to them and they prepared me (for the marriage). Unexpectedly Allah's Apostle came to me in the forenoon and my mother handed me over to him, and at that time I was a girl of nine years of age. Volume 5, Book 58, Number 236:

Narrated by Hisham's father

Khadija died three years before the Prophet departed to Medina. He stayed there for two years or so and then he married 'Aisha when she was a girl of six years of age, and he consumed that marriage when she was nine years old.

Answer 2

No. That is not true. The real age of Aisha was 18 or 19 at the time the marriage was consummated. Please see the Related Link below for a detailed discussion of this.

Answer 3

Source Material:Sahih Bukhari

Volume 7, Book 62, Number 64:

Narrated by 'Aisha That the Prophet married her when she was six years old and he consummated his marriage when she was nine years old, and then she remained with him for nine years (i.e., till his death).

Volume 7, Book 62, Number 65:

Narrated by 'Aisha That the Prophet married her when she was six years old and he consummated his marriage when she was nine years old, Hisham said: I have been informed that 'Aisha remained with the Prophet for nine years (i.e. till his death)." What you know of the Quran (by heart)'

Volume 7, Book 62, Number 88:

Narrated by 'Ursa The Prophet wrote the (marriage contract) with 'Aisha while she was six years old and consummated his marriage with her while she was nine years old and she remained with him for nine years (i.e. till his death).

Volume 5, Book 58, Number 234:

Narrated by 'Aisha The Prophet engaged me when I was a girl of six (years). We went to Medina and stayed at the home of Bani-al-Harith bin Khazraj. Then I got ill and my hair fell down. Later on my hair grew (again) and my mother, Um Ruman, came to me while I was playing in a swing with some of my girl friends. She called me, and I went to her, not knowing what she wanted to do to me. She caught me by the hand and made me stand at the door of the house. I was breathless then, and when my breathing became Allright, she took some water and rubbed my face and head with it. Then she took me into the house. There in the house I saw some Ansari women who said, "Best wishes and Allah's Blessing and a good luck." Then she entrusted me to them and they prepared me (for the marriage). Unexpectedly Allah's Apostle came to me in the forenoon and my mother handed me over to him, and at that time I was a girl of nine years of age.

Volume 5, Book 58, Number 236:

Narrated by Hisham's father Khadija died three years before the Prophet departed to Medina. He stayed there for two years or so and then he married 'Aisha when she was a girl of six years of age, and he consumed that marriage when she was nine years old.

Answer 4

Hazrat Muhammad SAW married, Hazrat Ayesha RAU, the young daughter of his best friend and closest follower on the request of the girl's father. She was about 7 to 9 years old. She lived in the house of his father. When she was about 11 years of age, she came to live with Hazrat Muhammad SAW.