“Her father,” namely Abu Bakr (may Allah be pleased with him).

Yet these people hate ʿĀʾishah: they insult and curse her even though she was the wife closest to the Messenger. How, then, can it be said that such people love the Messenger? How can it be claimed that they love the Messenger’s family? These are empty assertions with no basis in truth.

It is therefore incumbent upon us to show due respect to the Messenger’s household: his believing relatives and his wives, the Mothers of the Believers. All of them belong to his household and all of them have rights over us.

The author next cited the verse we have just mentioned: “Allah only intends to remove impurity from you, O people of the household, and to purify you completely.” This indicates flawless purity—the removal of intangible defilement. Allah says, “…to remove impurity from you…” and “…to purify you completely,” the latter following the removal of the stain. Tatḥīr (purification) entails both cleansing and adornment, and the emphatic verbal noun “tatḥīran” shows that the purification is absolute.

For this reason, whoever accuses any of the Prophet’s wives of adultery—Allah forbid—has fallen into disbelief, even if the one maligned is someone other than ʿĀʾishah.

As for ʿĀʾishah herself, anyone who levels against her the slander from which Allah absolved her is a disbeliever who rejects Allah; his life and property become lawful to the Islamic authority. And the one who slanders any of the other wives with adultery is, according to the soundest scholarly view, likewise a disbeliever, for such a claim is the gravest insult to the Messenger of Allah ﷺ—suggesting that his marital bed was shared by women who commit fornication, Allah forbid. Allah the Exalted says, “The vile women are for the vile men, and the vile men …”