A Love That Did Not Fade

Years after her death, in Madinah, the Prophet ﷺ still spoke of Khadijah so often that 'A'ishah said she was never as jealous of any woman as she was of Khadijah, whom she had never even seen. When he slaughtered a sheep, he would cut it up and send portions to Khadijah's old friends (Sahih al-Bukhari 3818). He said of her, "I was given the gift of her love" (Sahih Muslim 2435).

Once her sister Halah asked permission to enter, and her voice was so like Khadijah's that he was startled and said, "O Allah — Halah!" (Sahih al-Bukhari 3821).

A report in the Musnad of Ahmad gives his own reasons: she believed in him when people disbelieved, she trusted him when people called him a liar, she supported him with her wealth when people withheld theirs, and Allah gave him children through her.

01Why it matters

Faithfulness to the people who stood by us does not end when they are gone; it continues through how we honour their memory and their loved ones.

02Reflection

Whose memory could you honour this week by being kind to someone they loved?

03Sources

Sahih al-Bukhari 3818 Sahih · in the two Sahihs
Sahih al-Bukhari 3821 Sahih · in the two Sahihs
Sahih Muslim 2435 Sahih · in the two Sahihs
Musnad AhmadGrade not recorded here

What the hadith grades mean

Sahih (authentic): an unbroken chain of trustworthy, precise narrators, free of hidden flaws or contradiction. It is acted upon.
Hasan (good): like sahih, but a narrator's precision is slightly lighter. It is also accepted and acted upon. "Hasan sahih" means it reaches sahih by its routes.
Da'if (weak): a break in the chain or a narrator who is not reliable enough. It is not used to establish beliefs or rulings.
Very weak (munkar, matruk): a seriously flawed chain or a narrator accused of lying. It is not relied on at all.
Mawdu' (fabricated): falsely attributed to the Prophet ﷺ. It may not be narrated as his words except to warn against it.
The two Sahihs: every hadith with a full chain in Sahih al-Bukhari and Sahih Muslim is accepted as sahih by the scholars of hadith.
Historical report: biographies and histories (Ibn Ishaq, Ibn Sa'd, al-Tabari) record events with chains that are often incomplete. They are used for the story, not for rulings.
Hadith scholars grade a narration; the four madhhabs do not. Where a hadith carries a ruling, the page shows which schools act on it.

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