“Yes.”
He replied, “Even if she were not my step-daughter raised in my care, she would still be unlawful for me. She is the daughter of my milk-brother, for Thuwaybah nursed both me and Abu Salamah. So do not offer your daughters or your sisters to me for marriage.”
(1) ʿUrwah said: Thuwaybah was a bond-woman belonging to Abu Lahab; Abu Lahab set her free, and she nursed the Prophet ﷺ. When Abu Lahab died, someone from his family saw him in a wretched state and asked, “What have you encountered?” Abu Lahab answered, “I have found no good since leaving you, except that I am given water in this (gesture) because I emancipated Thuwaybah.”
al-ḥaybah, with a kasrah on the ḥāʾ: means “condition.”
Unusual vocabulary:
• bimukhliya: with ḍammah on the mīm, sukūn on the khāʾ, and kasrah on the lām. It is the active participle of akhlā yukhliy (“to leave empty”), meaning: “I shall not be alone with you, nor free of a co-wife.”
• nuḥaddathu: with ḍammah on the nūn and fatḥah on the khāʾ; passive construction.
• “the daughter of Umm Salamah”: an interrogative posed to verify the exact person intended.
• “my step-daughter raised in my care”: rabībah derives from rabb (“to nurture”), because the guardian looks after her affairs.
• ḥijr may be read with fatḥah or kasrah on the ḥāʾ; here the phrase simply echoes the Qur’anic wording without further legal implication.
• Thuwaybah: with ḍammah on the initial thāʾ, fatḥah on the wāw, then a diminutive yāʾ, followed by a bāʾ and hāʾ.
• bi-sharri ḥaybah: with kasrah on the ḥāʾ, sukūn on the yāʾ, and a bāʾ—meaning “in a bad state.” Some copies of al-Bukhārī vocalize it with a khāʾ instead.
Overall meaning:
Umm Ḥabībah (2) bint Abū Sufyān—one of the Mothers of the Believers, may Allah be pleased with them—was greatly honored and happy to be married to the Messenger of Allah ﷺ, and rightly so. Yet she asked the Prophet ﷺ to marry her sister. The Prophet ﷺ was astonished that she could consent to having a co-wife, given women’s intense jealousy in such matters; hence he asked in amazement, “Would you really like that?” She replied, “Yes, I would.”
She then clarified the reason she was content for him to marry her sister: she felt that she must… (3)