Mariyah the Sex Slave of the Holy Prophet

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This article is an essay/op-ed by Dr. Ali Sina of FFI. Pen-icon2.png

The following is Muhammad’s scandalous love affair with Mariyah the Copt who was one of the prophet’s wives’ maids. Muhammad slept with her without any ceremony, which caused uproar among his wives and finally was settled by Divine intervention. This story is recorded in an authenticated Hadith and is reported by Omar.

This Hadith is describing the reason for the revelation of verse 66: 4 of the Qur'an. The verse says:



Narrated 'Abdullah bin 'Abbas:







The above Hadith is significant as it contains two important historic points. First it reveals, by Omar’s own admission, that “Ansari women had the upper hand over their men”. Even if we consider that to be an exaggeration, it is clear that women in Medina had more rights and authority than their Quraishy counterparts. Mecca, the home of the Quraish tribe, where Omar and Muhammad came from was a religious hob. People living in religious towns are more bigots than those living in other cities. Religion has always played a role in subjugating women and taking away their human rights. So it is natural that women in Mecca were more subdued than those living anywhere else in Arabia and especially Medina that was a more cosmopolitan city having civilized nations like Jews and Christians as its inhabitants. Omar and Muhammad’s wives enjoyed this emancipating atmosphere and were starting to exercise their relative freedom. This attitude, of course, did not sit well with the two misogynist men of Mecca, namely Omar and Muhammad and as this Hadith demonstrates, they were angry of their wives newfound liberties and rebelliousness.

The importance of this Hadith is in the fact that it proves that women prior to Islam had much more freedom, which was taken away from them by Muhammad and his misogynistic khalifas. It becomes clear that the deplorable status of women in Islam is not a divine verdict but a reflection of how women were treated in Mecca 1400 years ago.

The fact that there is so much emphasis in the Qur'an and in Ahadith about the importance of women being obedient to their husbands is indeed an indication of Muhammad’s own desire to control his young and rebellious wives. (See Quran 4:34)

The other important point of the above Hadith is that it reveals yet another sexual scandal of the prophet.



However, Hafsa would not control herself and relays everything to Aisha who also turns against the prophet and jointly with his other wives cause him much anguish. So the prophet decides to punish all of them and not sleep with any one of his wives for one month. Depriving one’s wives sexually is the second grade of punishment recommended in Qur'an. The first level is admonishing, the second level is depriving them of sex and the third level of punishment is beating them. Quran 4:34


This is the text of the Surah Tahrim: 66:1-5.




Although Muhammad gave his word to Hafsa, not to have sex with her maid he could not resist the temptation. Especially now that he had taken another oath not to sleep with all of his wives. It was a difficult situation and no one but Allah could help him. Well, nothing is impossible when you are the prophet of Allah. Leave everything in the hands of the Almighty and let him take care of it. And that is exactly what happened. Allah himself intervened and gave him the green light to follow his heart's desire. In the Surah Tahrim God licensed his beloved prophet to have his flings and not pay attention to his wives. What can a prophet ask more? Allah was so concerned about Muhammad's carnal pleasures that he even allowed ALL MEN to break their oaths as a bounty. Isn't Allah great?

It is also worthy of mention that Muhammad who came to know that Hafsa did reveal the secret to Aisha, lied to her by pretending that it was Allah who told him so (Ayat 3) while he actually learned it from Ayisha. But of course Muhammad is not the author of the Qur'an. It is Allah himself who is lying for his prophet.

In reaction to the above verses, Aisha, who was not only young and pretty but also clever, is reported to have said to Muhammad, "Your God indeed rushes in coming to your aid!"

The above story must have been also embarrassing for Muhammad’s followers even when they gobbled mindlessly everything he told them that they made other hadiths to explain away those verses of the Qur'an that were already explained by Omar.

'A'isha (Allah be pleased with her) narrated that Allah's Apostle (may peace be upon him) used to spend time with Zainab daughter of Jahsh and drank honey at her house. She ('A'isha further) said: I and Hafsa agreed that one whom Allah's Apostle (may peace be upon him) would visit first should say: I notice that you have an odour of the Maghafir (gum of mimosa). He (the Holy Prophet) visited one of them and she said to him like this, whereupon he said: I have taken honey in the house of Zainab bint Jabsh and I will never do it again. It was at this (that the following verse was revealed): 'Why do you hold to be forbidden what Allah has made lawful for you... (up to). If you both ('A'isha and Hafsa) turn to Allah" up to:" And when the Holy Prophet confided an information to one of his wives" (lxvi. 3). This refers to his saying: But I have taken honey.

The existence of the above Hadith and its difference with the one narrated by Omar reveals yet another fact that the companions of Muhammad were willing to lie, (as Muslims are today) to save the image of their prophet from blemish. It would be foolish to accept the excuse of drinking honey to justify those Ayat. First of all honey does not smell bad. But above all it is inconceivable that a trivial incident like drinking honey could cause such an upheaval in the household of Muhammad to the extend that he decides to divorce all of his wives or to punish them for one month by not sleeping with them. Could such an insignificant incident like drinking honey provoke so much uproar that the creator of this universe be forced to intervene with a warning to Muhammad’s wives that he would divorce all of them and He (Allah) would give him virgin and faithful wives? This explanation is absurd unless honey is a code name for what Muhammad drank from between the legs of Mariyah, which incidentally is very likely when you consider the following hadith:

Narrated Aisha, Ummul Mu'minin: The Apostle of Allah (peace be upon him) was asked about a man who divorced his wife three times, and she married another who entered upon her, but divorced her before having intercourse with her, whether she was lawful for the former husband. She said: The Prophet (peace be upon him) replied: She is not lawful for the first (husband) until she tastes the honey of the other husband and he tastes her honey.

Yet some Muslims still claim that the Hadiths quoted above narrated by Abdullah bin 'Abbas are false and the correct version is the one about honey. This is a nonsense. This hadith is recorded by both Bukahri and by Muslim. Furthermore it is the only logical explanation of the sha'ne nozool (context) of the Surah Tharim. According to Muslim scholar Asif Iftikhar "a Hadith can be regarded as a source of religious guidance only `if the basis of that Hadith exists in the Quran or the Sunnah or the established principles." We can clearly see that the Qur'an allows having sex with the "right hand possessions" i.e. slaves (Quran 4:24) and it was Muhammad's habit to have sex with his slave women. The text of the Surah makes it also clear that it is about having sex and not eating honey which is a silly explanation. Asif Iftikhar writes:

"Imam Ibni Ali Jauzee is reported to have said: "If you find a Hadith against the dictates of common sense or contrary to a universal rule, consider it a fabrication."

The story of honey is ludicrous and makes no sense. Why so much ado about honey? And who said honey smells bad? This hadith has been forged because obviously even in those early days, Muslims felt embarrassed about the actions of their prophet. However the hadiths about Muhammad sending Hafsa out so he could have sex with Mariyah makes perfect sense. It is in accordance with the Qur'an and in conformity with Muhammad's depravity of conduct. It was not unusual for Muhammad to solicit sex from women whom he found attractive.

This story is also reported by Ibn Sa'd in Tabaqat:


Qasim ibn Muhammad of course tries to find justification for Muhammad's breach of his own premise. His words had no validity why he gave them and if they were valid why he broke them?

My copy of the Qur'an contains the following tafseer side by side with the Surah Tahrim.


Mariyah was a white Coptic young woman and very beautiful. She bore Ibrahim to Muhammad. I had my doubt about Ibrahim being Muhammad's son. As per my research, Muhammad, during the last years of his life was suffering from acromegaly. One side-effect of this degenerative disease is impotence. He had erectile dysfunction. Note that Muhammad had seven children with Khadijah who was already forty years old when she married him, but no children with more than twenty young women with whom he had sex in the last ten years of his life. There are hadiths that show he actually did not have intercourse with his wives but “fondled” them, and often he would go from one wife to another in one night touching their genitals but not practicing the intercourse. Another hadith says he used to imagine having sex when in reality he did not (Sahih Bukhari 7:71:660). Aisha says “none of you have the self control of the Prophet for he could fondle his wives but not have intercourse” The young and inexperienced woman did not realize that her illustrious husband, was not controlling himself, but simply could not do it. Cialis and Viagra were not yet invented.

There was a hole in my theory. If Muhammad was impotent how could he sire Ibrahim? I suspected that the child could have belonged to someone else, but had no evidence to prove it. I finally got the evidence. The same Tabaqat when talking about Mariyah says that there was a Coptic man in Medina who used to visit Mariyah and rumor circulated that he was her lover. Mariyah was relocated to a garden to the North of Medina apparently because Mo's other wives did not like her. The rumor reached Muhammad who sent Ali to kill the man. The story says that the man exposed himself and Ali saw that he was an eunuch and spared his life.

Apparently this was a convenient alibi to silence the crowd. Also Aisha was accused of having an affair with Safwan a young man from Medina also. Later she claimed that Safwan was eunuch. How could he become an eunuch in Medina and no one know? Only Aisha can explain that.

The story is clearly forged. How could this Coptic man know why Ali wants to kill him? Ibn Sa'd the author of Tabaqat says that he saw Ali with his sword in his hand and climbed a date tree with fear and from there he exposed his genital (awrat). There is no conversation exchanged. The man simply knew why Ali wants to kill him. This does not sound a true story. Why would a messenger of God want to kill an innocent man and how did this man know why Ali wants to kill him? Looks like this Coptic man had a better understanding of the unknown than the prophet of Allah.


The following hadith adds that when the sun eclipsed Muhammad...


Ghaira is the very thing for which Muslims commit honor killing. If you look at a Muslim's wife or daughter, it is his ghaira that is being offended. If he does not react, it shows that he has little ghaira. The greater is his ghaira the more violent will be his reaction.

The discussion about adultery at this time is quite revealing. Why would he choose to talk about adultery, of all things, in this moment? It’s not hard to imagine that Muhammad was thinking about it and was not very sure whether Ibrahim was his son or not. In this sermon Muhammad talked about Allah having a lot of ghaira and then speaks of prohibition of adultery. He concludes his sermon by saying he knows of very sad things that others don't know.

Another point to bear in mind is that despite the fact the Mariyah was the only women who bore Muhammad a child, he did not marry her. Doesn't this tell us that he was not very sure about her loyalty?

In another version of this hadith it says.

"Narrated 'Abdullah bin Abbas: "The Prophet then said, "The sun and the moon are two of the signs of Allah. They eclipse neither because of the death of somebody nor because of his life (i.e. birth). So when you see them, remember Allah." The people say, "O Allah's Apostle! We saw you taking something from your place and then we saw you retreating." The Prophet replied, "I saw Paradise and stretched my hands towards a bunch (of its fruits) and had I taken it, you would have eaten from it as long as the world remains. I also saw the Hell-fire and I had never seen such a horrible sight. I saw that most of the inhabitants were women." The people asked, "O Allah's Apostle! Why is it so?" The Prophet replied, "Because of their ungratefulness." It was asked whether they are ungrateful to Allah. The Prophet said, "They are ungrateful to their companions of life (husbands) and ungrateful to good deeds. If you are benevolent to one of them throughout the life and if she sees anything (undesirable) in you, she will say, 'I have never had any good from you.' "

As these hadiths reveal, in this occasion Muhammad did not speak much about his only son' death. The death of his only son, must have been devastating for him, especially when we know he did not have much respect for girls and thought it is degrading for Allah to have only daughters when ordinary men have sons. But on the day of death of his only son, he chooses to speak about adultery and how women will be sent to hell because they are ungrateful to their husbands.

The story is not important especially since Ibrahim died at infancy and left no descendants. And of course I can't prove it either. But if true, it validates my finding that Muhammad, in his advanced age suffered from acromegaly, of which he died and was impotent. His insatiable lust for sex was due to his frustrated sexual impulse.


See Also

