and a just ordinance, an all-embracing good, through which He tightens the bonds of kinship and makes them incumbent upon humankind. Allah, Exalted is He, says:
“It is He who created a human being from water and then made him a lineage and an in-law; your Lord has always been All-Powerful.” (2)

Bear witness that I have married Fāṭimah to ʿAlī for a bridal-gift of four hundred mithqāls of silver, provided he is content with that, in accordance with the established sunnah and the obligatory decree… May Allah unite them, bless them, and make their progeny pure and wholesome… I say these words of mine, and I seek the forgiveness of Allah the Tremendous.”

The Lady of the women of the Muslims was then escorted to her husband’s house. Her trousseau consisted of nothing more than a rope-strung bed, a leather pillow stuffed with palm-fibre, a nūrah (3) made of leather, a water-skin, and a sieve,