The Mothers of the Believers

أُمَّهَاتُ الْمُؤْمِنِين

The wives of the Prophet ﷺ, whom the Qur'an calls mothers of the believers.

Eleven women were married to the Prophet ﷺ across his life, and the Qur'an gives them a standing of their own: mothers of the believers. They were not a category in the background of the story. A great deal of what is known about how he lived — inside the house, not on the battlefield — reaches us only because they were there and were asked, for decades afterwards. Several of them taught, corrected and were consulted long after he died.