from you, O members of the household, all impurity, and to purify you thoroughly.” [al-Ahzab 33]

The Prophet ﷺ also said: “The best of you are those who are best to their families, and I am the best of you to my family.” (1)

Indeed, it would be a strong view to say that the members of his household are only his wives and those whom he supports, because this is how people commonly understand the term. Today, if your paternal uncle and your brother each live in a separate house, people would not say that they are members of your household. Thus, in customary usage, the members of one’s household are the wives, sons, and daughters whom he supports. In any case, however, wives unquestionably fall under the term “members of his household” if he has not divorced them, though they do not fall under the term “relatives.”

His statement, “and his people,” is treated by the author as equivalent to the terms “relatives” and “members of his household.” But this view is far from correct, because in both common usage and the Arabic language, a person’s people are broader in scope than his relatives—unless one adopts the view that relatives include everyone who shares the first ancestor through whom he is identified. On that view, a clan-branch of a tribe is considered relatives, and it may then be said that “his people” and “his relatives” have the same meaning. But if we say that his relatives are his children, his father’s children, his grandfather’s children, and his paternal great-grandfather’s children, then his people are undoubtedly broader in scope. This is why Allah sends Messengers to their peoples, though those peoples are not their relatives. Therefore, when “his people” has a consistently established meaning in common usage, such that an unrestricted reference can only be understood accordingly, it must be followed, because the stronger view concerning