Aisha….Oh, Aisha, the mother of Muslims and the wife of Muhammad. The wonderful controversial women that people love to hate. Sunnis love her and Shia prefer Fatima, the daughter of Muhammad. Out of all the women, the Prophet associated with three women stand out the most, which is quite surprising with all the wives the Prophet had. Khadija was the first wife of the Prophet, the first Muslim, mother of his children, and the only wife of his until her death. Aisha was the only wife of the Muhammad that was a virgin and the youngest bride close in age to Fatima. She was, after Khadija, his favorite wife, so she was often in his company. Aisha was a feisty powerful that Bitch of a woman, she led battles, gave sermons and advise to the followers.

Yet what Westerners know of Aisha can be summed down to is her being a 6-year-old rape victim of the Prophet. The proof to Westerners that Islam is an evil religion, with a leader who enjoyed raping small little girls and etc. Summing Aisha up to nothing more than a rape victim, not a woman who was very powerful in her own right and a key figure in Islam, is extremely problematic, especially since she didn’t consider herself a victim. 

So, was Aisha, a 6-year-old girl, when she married the Prophet? Yes and No. Marriage in the Hijaz region and many parts of the world did not need consummation as soon as someone marries, while European culture requires such action. The type of marriage Aisha was under would be more closely resembling an engagement period time. Aisha was promised to Muhamad, which would be considered an honor. Arrange marriages or promising newborn babies to another person, was fairly common in Asian cultures and countries. Arrange marriages were also quite common in European culture as well, especially among the wealthy, It strengthens the ties of the families and encouraged stronger business endeavors. Yet scholars aren’t sure if she was even promised at this early of an age.

In fact, some accounts of her marriage and consummation of the marriage are given by Aisha herself. Why would Aisha lie about her age being younger? Aisha was accused of adultery after she was left behind on an outing. A man came by and picked her up to take her to the city, she rode alongside him. The people began to speak, accusing her of cheating on her husband. Aisha left Muhammad and was angry that he would even consider that she would cheat on him. Of course, she was furious! Who would like to be accused of sleeping with strange men? After this scandal blew over, Muhammad was given the verse that saved her; the community continuously tried to find ways to cleave their way into the Prophets life. Aisha had to prove she was as young as possible when she married the Prophet because it prevented the community from accusing her of not being a virgin before marriage.

It wasn’t as if being a virgin was a top priority to the Prophet. In fact, most of his wives were widows with children with previous husbands and not virgins. Khadijah herself was not a forty-year-old virgin bride either. Marriage to widows wasn’t odd and having virgin brides weren’t a requirement of the Arab society of this time. Which is ironic since many Muslims stress virginity like no other, even creating laws to do “virgin” test on women. The founding women of Islam weren’t virgins, besides Aisha and Fatima. Aisha wasn’t a sexual deviant woman mind you, she followed the seclusion principles set down for the wives of the Prophet and did similar things as every other woman in her community. So, to make sure everyone would stop talking about her, she and a few companions said she was 9 when she had sex for the first time.

Aisha was more likely between 15-19 years old when she consummated her marriage, which would have been highly standard in this region. Having sex with a girl not sexually mature (in the organs) would have been taboo because people were aware of the dangers, this doesn’t mean people didn’t have sex with young girls, they still do. Even in the United States people have been jailed for raping young children. Young girls can die from having penis penetration, and many children around the world die because of this. Since the Prophet was not known to have sex with children or slave boys, we know he didn’t fancy little girls. Nor did the Prophet continue to marry anyone as young as Aisha. The Prophet did not encourage rape and verbally accosted followers who would sexually harass women.

 Jasser Auda’s believes that Aisha was 19 years old, not 9 when she first married the Prophet, basing off the Hijri Calendar. A non-authentic narration remained in the Bukhari and Muslim hadith collection, stating the Prophet consummated his marriage with Aisha at “nine years old.” Other hadiths contradict this unauthentic one, saying Aisha was evolved in the Battle of Uhud in Hijri year 2, which would mean she would have been 10 years old if she was married at 9. Bukhari also stated that Aisha saw her father migrate to Abyssinia, but if she were a nine-year-old in hijra 2, she wouldn’t have witnessed the event. As the migration to Abyssinia was around 9 years before Hijra 1. Aisha narrated being a girl between 6-13 at the revelation of sura al-Qamar, which was revealed between years 2 and 4 of the Hijra or between years 11 and 9 before the Hijra. So according to this, she must have been between 15-24 when she married. Narrations by Ibn Ishaq show she was the 19th person to embrace Islam, 13 years before the hijra, and was a young girl at this time.

Auda believes Hisham ibn Urwa was the source of the 9-year-old verse because he was accused of falsifying hadiths. Other hadiths also mention Aisha being engaged to Jubair ibn mut’am ibn Adiyy, so she would have to been engaged as an infant if she was later engaged to the Prophet at nine. Other hadiths mention her being promised to the Prophet at birth, which also contradicts other hadiths stating she was alive before the Prophets revelations. Aisha was 10 years younger than her sister Asma Bint Abu Baker, who was 17 when the Quran was revealed to Muhammad. Making Aisha 7 years old when Muhammad received the message. So Auda concludes that she must have been 19 years old when she married. Other scholars have concluded Aisha being 15 years old when she consummated her marriage. Both Ages 15 and 19 are relatively young but would have been an average age of marriage in such a community. Even today, many girls have babies in their teen years and get married at 19 years of age, consensually.

Aisha never had children with the Prophet, nor did any of his wives besides Khadija. Yet she and the wives were taken care of by Aisha’s father and the other companions. Aisha gave advise to the four Caliphs and even led the Battle of the Camel, which she lost. After her failure at the Battle of the Camel, she went into seclusion. Her lost signaled for many men to exclude women from leadership positions. Perhaps Aisha was embarrassed at her lost and remained hidden from the spotlight, or maybe she saw that her loss would be used to degrade women in Islam. She was one of the most important companions of the Prophet, she and others helped establish the hadith collections and the Quran. It is sad that many people focus on her age and not her actual greatness and love for her husband. Don’t believe me about her love for the Prophet? The Prophet ended up spending most of his time with her, while the other wives were persuaded (by Aisha) to give up their time with him. She was there for his death and even tricked a woman into divorcing herself from the Prophet. Aisha did not consider herself a victim of the Prophet, nor did she live in the lap of luxury living with the Prophet. Focusing on her age at marriage diminishes such a great woman who most likely was 15 -19 when she actually consummated her marriage.