42Women and the Transmission of Religious Knowledge in Islam are listed as narrating from Umm Salama, the majority do not belong to her kinship or clientage circles. ~ In several instances when messengers were sent to ‘A’isha and Umm Salama, the phrase “I entered the quarters of” (dakbaltu ‘aid) is used. Whether or not there was a physical barrier (hijdb) between ‘A’isha or Umm Salama and the messenger (a detail not regularly provided in such narratives), it is noteworthy that the broader community of men and women frequented the quarters of these two wives seeking religious knowledge - an accessibility not characteristic of the other wives. ‘A’isha’s narratives, in particular, vividly convey her expansive interpretations of the hijdb rulings. In a variant of the aforementioned report in which a servant girl is the intermediary between ‘A’isha and Ibn Shihab alKhawlanl, ‘A’isha directly advises a visitor about how to deal with traces of ritual impurity on his clothes. The Arabic wording speaks of a more informal exchange in which ‘A’isha herself observes a visitor washing his clothes and advises him on the proper behavior to ensure ritual purity ( ‘an ‘Alqama wa ’l-Aswad anna rajulan nazala bi- A ’isha fa-asbaba yaghsilu thawba-hu. . .).s She assures him that rather than washing the entire garment, he could have just cleansed the specific spot where he observed the impurity or sprinkled water around the area if he just suspected impurity but did not actually see it. The reference to ‘A’isha’s visitor is best understood in conjunction with Ibn Sa‘d’s description of the dwellings of Muhammad’s wives, each of which bordered the mosque and had its own entrance onto the communal gathering area of the mosque. In this context, we can envision a fluid situation where those staying in the mosque may have been observed by the wives, and as the report above suggests, their interactions could serve as a medium for transmitting religious knowledge. Another tradition concerns ‘A’isha’s contact with the blind poet Hassan b. Thabit (d. 54/674). Masruq goes to visit her and finds Hassan reciting poetry in her presence. He wants to know why she allows him to 82 For a list of those who narrated from ‘A’isha, see her biography in al-MizzI, Tabdhib , 35:227-36; for those who narrated from Umm Salama, see al-MizzI, Tahdbib, 35:317-20. 83 Muslim, Sahib, 2:1:159-60. 84 See Ibn Sa‘d, al-Tabaqat, 8:117-20. Stowasser also notes that the wives’ dwellings served as a physical extension of the mosque space where many members of the community would congregate. See Stowasser, Women in the Qur ’an, 91. 85 al-Bukharl, Sahib, 5-6:468-69. Al-MizzI provides additional versions in Tuhfa, 11:740. See also Spellberg, Politics, 70-73 and 94-95 for further discussion of Hassan’s role during the incident.