Men and women – a lot of research has gone into analyzing and studying the differences in their physical forms, physiologies, and psychological makeup, as well as their functional roles in the overall scheme of things i.e., life in this world.
The topic is sensitive because it raises important questions about gender roles, and inevitably ruffles a few feathers when, during these discussions, either men or women appear to come out superior to the other in some aspects of human nature.
Prophet Muhammad: The Ideal Husband
In the Quran, Allah has describes Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) as the role model we should emulate and follow in every aspect of life.
” There has certainly been for you in the Messenger of Allah an excellent pattern for anyone whose hope is in Allah and the Last Day and [who] remembers Allah often”. Qur’an (33:21)
He played many roles during his life, but the one role that he took on very early as a youth, and which stayed as a constant role in his life till his death at the age of 63, was that of a husband.
Muhammad was a husband even before becoming a Prophet, father, battalion leader, judge, or leader of the Muslim ummah.
Marriage played a central role during his life.
Allah decreed marriage as a means for him to gain financial stability and security (via his wife Khadjiah’s ample wealth); to raise his young children (by marrying Saudah after Khadijah’s death); to form important liaisons (e.g. by marrying Umm Habibah); to establish Islamic laws (e.g. by marrying his cousin Zainab, who abolished an Arab custom that prohibited marrying an adopted son’s divorcee); and to spread the message of Islam far and wide (e.g. his young wife A’ishah propagated over 2000 narrations, and excelled in jurisprudence, especially that related to sexual intimacy and female impurity).
However, before Muhammad became a Prophet of Allah and the official torch-bearer of the Deen of Islam, he was married only once, to an older lady who had been widowed twice already – Khadijah.
Spent Youth Happily Married to Just One Woman, 15 Years Older
Despite living in an extremely misogynistic and patriarchal society where men did whatever they wanted and females were oppressed, exploited and killed with open abandon; where men married an unrestricted number of women according to their whims and fancies, Muhammad stayed chaste as a young man, getting married only after an older woman proposed to him through a third person, and his guardian gave him the go-ahead.
Belonging to an influential and honorable Arab clan, he could have married a multitude of women had he so wished while he was young, i.e., from the age of 25-40, a period when a young man’s sexual desire peaks, but he did not. Instead, he remained married only to Khadijah until her death.
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