Khadija bint Khuwaylid, the First to Believe

Khadija bint Khuwaylid, may Allah be pleased with her, was the first wife of the Prophet Muhammad ﷺ, the mother of most of his children, and the first person to believe in Islam. A wealthy merchant of Makkah known as at-Tahira, the Pure, she hired a young man famous for his honesty to trade on her behalf, then married him. Fifteen years later, when he came home shaking from the cave of Hira, she was the one who steadied him. The Prophet ﷺ loved her for the rest of his life.

The merchant of Makkah

Long before Islam, Khadija was one of the most respected people in Makkah. She ran her own trading business, sending caravans north to Syria and paying honest people to lead them. When she heard about a young man the whole city called al-Amin, the Trustworthy, she hired him. Muhammad ﷺ took her goods to Syria with her servant Maysara, dealt fairly with everyone, and came back with more profit than she had ever seen. Maysara also came back with stories: about his honesty, his kindness, and the way he was. Khadija, who had turned down many proposals, sent word that she wished to marry him. He was twenty-five. It was the happiest home in Makkah.

The night everything changed

The Prophet ﷺ liked to go alone to a cave on Mount Hira to think and worship. One night the angel Jibril came to him there with the first words of the Qur'an: "Read, in the name of your Lord who created" (Surah al-Alaq 96:1). He ran home trembling and said, "Cover me, cover me." Khadija wrapped him in a cloak and listened. Then she said the words that are still told in every seerah class: "Never. By Allah, Allah will never disgrace you. You keep ties with your family, you carry the burdens of the weak, you give to those who have nothing, you welcome guests, and you help people in every hardship" (Sahih al-Bukhari). She did not doubt him for a moment. She took him to her cousin Waraqa ibn Nawfal, who knew the earlier scriptures, and Waraqa told them this was the same angel who had come to Musa, peace be upon him.

The first believer

Khadija was the first person on earth to believe in the message of the Prophet Muhammad ﷺ, before any man, woman, or child. She prayed beside him when almost no one else did. When the leaders of Makkah turned against the Muslims and shut the Prophet's ﷺ family into a valley for three years with little food, she stayed with him and spent her wealth until it was gone. She was old by then, and the hardship wore her down. She passed away in the tenth year of prophethood, before the migration to Madinah, in a year the Prophet ﷺ remembered as the Year of Sorrow.

A greeting from Jibril

One day Jibril came to the Prophet ﷺ and said: Khadija is coming with food for you. When she arrives, give her greetings of peace from her Lord and from me, and give her the good news of a house in Paradise made of pearl, where there is no noise and no tiredness (Sahih al-Bukhari, Sahih Muslim). Years after she passed, the Prophet ﷺ still spoke of her so often, and sent gifts to her friends so faithfully, that Aisha, may Allah be pleased with her, said she was never jealous of any woman as she was of Khadija, whom she had never met. He answered that Khadija believed in him when people rejected him, and supported him when others left him (Musnad Ahmad). The Prophet ﷺ counted her among the best women who ever lived, with Maryam, Asiya, and their daughter Fatimah.

What children learn from Khadija

• Honesty is worth more than gold. Khadija chose the Prophet ﷺ because he was the most honest man she knew, before anyone knew he would be a prophet.
• Believe in good people when it is hard. She was the first to believe, when believing cost everything.
• Comfort with actions. When he was afraid, she did not argue. She wrapped him up, listened, and went to find answers.
• Generosity that empties the purse. She spent her whole fortune on the believers and never asked for it back.

Khadija's story pairs naturally with the companions in Sukun Kids: Abu Bakr, who believed straight after her, Bilal, whose freedom the believers' wealth bought, and her daughter's world in Aisha's story. The women of Islam guide places her beside Maryam and Asiya.