40 Women and the Transmission of Religious Knowledge in Islam Zaynab bint Jahsh’s biographies are replete with accounts of her divorce from Zayd b. Haritha, the Prophet’s adopted son, and her subsequent divinely ordained marriage to Muhammad. Two occasions of revelation are linked to the Prophet’s relationship with her. Yet none of her traditions touches on these matters. ’ Finally, there are fewer explicit indications that these seven wives were consulted by those outside of their kin and clientage circles. 1 Reports frequently depict Companions such as Abu Hurayra or Marwan dispatching messengers to ‘A’isha and Umm Salama with questions on the Prophet’s sunna. When the other wives are sought out, it is usually by their male relatives or by other women. s In general, the traditions of these seven wives are presented as relatively brief pronouncements without an elaborate narrative structure to situate the encounter. Ramla bint Abl Sufyan’s narrations reinforce the point that the wives were available for direct consultation primarily to members of their families and client groups and to other women. In isnads from the Tuhfat al-Ashrdf and al-Musnad al-Jami‘, Ramla is credited with narrating to eighteen men and women. Ten of these are women or men in her kinship and clientage circle. The remaining eight are men who do not belong to these categories. The narratives preserved by the Sunn! compilers contain details of the encounters in cases where related men or women narrate from her. Thus, we have her brother Mu‘awiya saying, “I asked Umm Hablba, the wife of the 72 These two revelations concern her divorce from Zayd and her marriage to Muhammad (Qur’an, 33:37-38, 40, 53), and the hijab regulations (Qur’an, 33:53-55). 73 Another such example is Maymuna, whose biographers focus on whether the Prophet married her while he was in ihram during the ‘umra performed in 7 AH. Over half of Ibn Sa‘d’s entry for Maymuna is devoted to traditions on this issue (see Ibn Sa'd, al-Tabaqat, 8:94-100). Yet only one of her hadith relates to this topic; see Ibn Hanbal, Musnad, 6:374, #26808, and Ibn Maja, Sunan, 1:632. 74 It is noteworthy that the canonical collections do not generally include isnads in which the narrator reporting on the authority of one of these seven co-wives is not her kin or client or is not especially prominent. Rather, such isnads occur in works such as the Musnad of Ibn Hanbal, which is reputed to contain some weak traditions. It is premature to assert a causal connection at this point since there may have been other reasons why compilers such as alBukhari and Muslim rejected isnads wherein there is no family connection. 75 For example, Mu’awiya, Ramla’s brother, seeks her out (Ibn Maja, Sunan, 1:209). Similarly, Maymuna’s mahram appear with frequency in her isnads. They include her nephew, ‘Abd Allah b. ‘Abbas, and her grandson, ‘Ubayd Allah b. ‘Abd Allah b. ‘Abbas (see, for example, al-Musnad al-Jdmi‘, 20:518-21, #17441—43; 20:531, #17455; and 20:533, #17458). 7 6 The isnads with these eight men are not cited in the Sahib collections of al-Bukhari and Muslim. Most of them appear only in the Musnad of Ibn Hanbal. However, as stated earlier, al-Bukhari and Muslim may have rejected these isnads for reasons aside from the fact that they are narrated by non-kin of Ramla.