[Hafṣah asked ʿĀʾishah to seek permission for her from the Messenger of Allah ﷺ, and she did so; Hafṣah then told her attendants to set up her enclosure, and it was put in place.] When Zaynab bint Jaḥsh saw this, she pitched another pavilion—she was a very jealous woman. When the Messenger of Allah ﷺ came in the morning (in another wording: when he left after the dawn prayer for the place where he intended to observe iʿtikāf) he noticed the tents and said, “What is this?” They replied, “The pavilions of ʿĀʾishah, Hafṣah, and Zaynab.” He said, “Do you think this is an act of piety on their part?” (In another narration: “Was it piety they meant by this? I am not going to observe iʿtikāf.”) In yet another version he remarked, “What made them do this—piety? Take them down so I will not see them,” and they were taken down. In one wording: “He ordered that his own shelter be dismantled and commanded his wives to dismantle theirs, so they were dismantled.” Because of this he abandoned the iʿtikāf for that month, and later performed a ten-day iʿtikāf in Shawwāl.

This ḥadith was recorded by al-Bukhārī, Muslim, Abū Dāwūd, al-Nasāʾī, Ibn Mājah, and Aḥmad through various routes from Yaḥyā ibn Saʿīd al-Anṣārī, who said: “ʿUmrah bint ʿAbd al-Raḥmān narrated to me from ʿĀʾishah” with the same content. The principal wording is that of al-Bukhārī; the second addition is also his, as are the third and fourth—Aḥmad likewise transmits them, together with the subsequent addition. The first addition belongs to Abū Dāwūd, and Muslim has something similar. The sixth addition comes from Abū ʿAwānah, as stated in Fatḥ. The seventh is al-Bukhārī’s, as are the eighth and ninth—Aḥmad also reports this last one. The second phrasing and the second and third versions are al-Bukhārī’s, while the third phrasing is that of Abū Dāwūd.

Al-Nasāʾī headed this ḥadith with the same chapter title he used for the first, saying: