ʿĀʾishah (born 614, Mecca, Arabia [now in Saudi Arabia]—died July 678, Medina) was the third wife of the Prophet Muhammad (the founder of Islam), who played a role of some political importance after the Prophet’s death.
All Muhammad’s marriages had political motivations, and in this case the intention seems to have been to cement ties with ʿĀʾishah’s father, Abū Bakr, who was one of Muhammad’s most important supporters. ʿĀʾishah’s physical charms, intelligence, and wit, together with the genuine warmth of their relationship, secured her a place in his affections that was not lessened by his subsequent marriages. It is said that in 627 she accompanied the Prophet on an expedition but became separated from the group. When she was later escorted back to Medina by a man who had found her in the desert, Muhammad’s enemies claimed that she had been unfaithful. A subsequent Qurʾānic revelation asserted her innocence; the Qurʾān furthermore criticized and stipulated punishment for those who slander virtuous women.
ʿĀʾishah had no important influence on her husband’s political or religious policies while he lived, but he is said to have recognized her knowledge of Islam by counseling his Companions to “take half your knowledge from Humayra,” Humayra (“Little Red One”) being his term of endearment for her.
When Muhammad died in 632, ʿĀʾishah was left a childless widow of about 18, although some sources suggest she was older. She remained politically inactive until the time of ʿUthmān (644–656; the third caliph, or leader of the Islamic community), during whose reign she played an important role in fomenting opposition that led to his murder in 656. She led an army against his successor, ʿAlī, when he refused to bring ʿUthmān’s murderers to justice, but she was defeated in the Battle of the Camel. The engagement derived its name from the fierce fighting that centred around the camel upon which ʿĀʾishah was mounted. Afterward she was allowed to return to Medina. She spent the rest of her days there in disbursing alms, transmitting Hadith (the sayings of the Prophet), and interpreting the Qurʾān.
Traditional sources describe ʿĀʾishah as learned in religion, issuing legal opinions and engaging in consultation with the older male Companions of the Prophet. About a sixth of the hadiths recorded by al-Bukhari in his famed work Al-Jāmiʿ al-Ṣaḥīḥ are cited on her authority. Modern Muslim feminists regard ʿĀʾishah as personifying an early Islamic idealization of women as the social and legal equal of men, valorized for their contributions in both the private and public spheres.