Stories of the Women of Islam for Kids

Ask most children to name someone from Islamic history and you will get a list of men. That is not because the women are missing from the sources. Allah devotes a whole surah to Maryam and holds up Asiya as an example for all believers. It is because we tell their stories less.

These four are worth knowing, and not only by daughters. Every one of them is a story about courage.

Maryam: the greatest of women

Allah says the angels said to her: O Maryam, indeed Allah has chosen you and purified you and chosen you above the women of the worlds. Her story is one of enormous difficulty carried alone: a young woman, pregnant by Allah's command, walking out to face a community certain to accuse her.

The image children remember is the palm tree. Exhausted and afraid, she was told to shake its trunk toward her, and it dropped fresh ripe dates, and a stream ran at her feet. And when she returned to her people carrying her son, she had vowed to Allah not to speak, so the newborn spoke instead, by Allah's permission. Read the story of Maryam →

Asiya: the woman inside the palace

Asiya was the wife of Fir'awn, the most powerful and most tyrannical man of his age, and she believed in Allah anyway, inside his own house, surrounded by everything wealth can buy.

Allah records her dua in the Qur'an: My Lord, build for me near You a house in Paradise. She had the finest palace on earth and she asked for a house near Allah instead. Children understand that trade immediately. Read the story of Asiya →

Hajar: the mother who ran

Left in a barren valley with an infant and a little water, Hajar did not sit and wait. She ran between two hills, Safa and Marwah, searching, seven times, and Allah brought water up at her son's feet. That spring is Zamzam, and it still runs today.

Every single pilgrim on Hajj walks between those two hills. Millions of people, every year, retracing the steps of a mother looking for water for her child. There is no greater honour given to anyone's effort in all of Islam.

Aisha: the one they asked

Aisha, radiyallahu anha, was famous for her mind. She questioned, she remembered, and she taught, and the companions came to her for answers. It was said of her that they were never confused about a matter and asked her without finding that she had knowledge of it. For a curious child, especially one who asks too many questions, she is the best possible role model. Read the story of Aisha →

Tell these to sons as well

It is worth saying plainly: these are not stories for girls. A boy who grows up knowing that Allah held up a woman inside Fir'awn's palace as an example for all believers, and that the whole ummah retraces a mother's footsteps every year on Hajj, has learned something about what Islam actually values.