Sulaym, and she said, “It is not right for me to marry a polytheist. Do you not know, Abū Ṭalḥah, that the gods you worship are carved by the slave of so-and-so, and that if you were to set them alight they would burn?”
He left, the words weighing on his heart, then returned to her and said, “That condition you proposed to me—I accept it.” Thus she had no bridal gift but Islam (1).
Muslim ibn Ibrāhīm reported: Ribʿī ibn ʿAbd Allāh ibn al-Jārūd al-Hudhalī informed us; al-Jārūd related to me; Anas ibn Mālik narrated:
“The Prophet ﷺ used to visit Umm Sulaym, and she would present him with something she had prepared for him. I had a younger brother nicknamed Abū ʿUmayr. One day the Prophet ﷺ visited us and said, ‘Why do I see Abū ʿUmayr so downcast?’ She replied, ‘The small bird he used to play with has died.’ The Prophet then began stroking his head and saying, ‘O Abū ʿUmayr, what became of the nughayr? (2)’ ”
Hammām related: Isḥāq ibn ʿAbd Allāh narrated to us, from Anas, who said:
“The Messenger of Allah ﷺ would not enter any house other than that of Umm Sulaym. He was asked about it, and he said, ‘I feel compassion for her; he was killed—’”
(1) Its chain of transmission is sound. The report appears in Tabaqat, 8/426–427; al-Hafiz also cites a similar wording in Al-Isaba, 13/226–227, drawing on Musnad Ahmad through the isnad of Hammad b. Salama—Thabit—and Ismail b. Abd Allah b. Abi Talha—from Anas… He remarks: “This hadith is supported by several other chains.”
Al-Nasaʾi, 6/114, records it through Jaʿfar b. Sulayman—Thabit—from Anas, who relates: “Abu Talha asked Umm Sulaym for marriage. She replied: ‘By Allah, a man like you, Abu Talha, is not refused, but you are a disbeliever while I am a Muslim woman, and it is unlawful for me to marry you. If you accept Islam, that will be my bridal-gift; I ask nothing else from you.’ He therefore embraced Islam, and that was her dowry.”
Thabit added: “I have never heard of a woman whose bridal-gift was more honorable than that of Umm Sulaym—the gift of Islam itself.” Abu Talha then married her, and she bore him a son.
(2) The chain is sound. Ibn Saʿd records it in Tabaqat, 8/427; al-Bukhari cites an abridged version, 10/436 and 480–481; Ibn Majah, no. 3720, through two routes; and Ahmad, 3/119, from Abu l-Tayyah, from Anas. Abu Dawud, no. 4969, transmits it through Musa b. Ismail—Hammad b. Salama—Thabit—from Anas.
Al-sawʿa (a bird smaller than a sparrow) and al-nughayr (diminutive of nughr, a young sparrow).