5 of 6 · Rabi' al-Awwal 11 AH · the Prophet's last illness · The room of 'A'ishah, Madinah
Fatimah bint Muhammad رضي الله عنها
The Whispered Secret
'A'ishah said that Fatimah came walking, and her walk was exactly the walk of the Prophet ﷺ. He welcomed her, "Welcome, my daughter," seated her beside him and whispered something to her, and she wept. Then he whispered again, and she laughed. 'A'ishah said she had never seen joy so close to grief, but Fatimah would not reveal the secret while her father lived.
After his death she told it. First he had told her that his time had come, and she wept. Then he told her that she would be the first of his family to follow him, and asked whether she was not pleased to be the leading lady of the women of Paradise — and she laughed (Sahih al-Bukhari 3623-3624).
As his pain grew, she cried out at her father's distress, and he said to her: "There is no more distress for your father after today" (Sahih al-Bukhari 4462). When he passed away, she mourned him in words still remembered, and asked Anas how they could bring themselves to pour earth over the Messenger of Allah ﷺ.
For Fatimah, the news that she would soon follow her father was the comfort, not the sorrow.
What would it mean to see meeting Allah as a reunion rather than a loss?
- Sahih al-Bukhari 3623 Sahih · in the two Sahihs
- Sahih al-Bukhari 3624 Sahih · in the two Sahihs
- Sahih al-Bukhari 4462 Sahih · in the two Sahihs
- Sahih Muslim 2450 Sahih · in the two Sahihs
What the hadith grades mean
- Sahih (authentic): an unbroken chain of trustworthy, precise narrators, free of hidden flaws or contradiction. It is acted upon.
- Hasan (good): like sahih, but a narrator's precision is slightly lighter. It is also accepted and acted upon. "Hasan sahih" means it reaches sahih by its routes.
- Da'if (weak): a break in the chain or a narrator who is not reliable enough. It is not used to establish beliefs or rulings.
- Very weak (munkar, matruk): a seriously flawed chain or a narrator accused of lying. It is not relied on at all.
- Mawdu' (fabricated): falsely attributed to the Prophet ﷺ. It may not be narrated as his words except to warn against it.
- The two Sahihs: every hadith with a full chain in Sahih al-Bukhari and Sahih Muslim is accepted as sahih by the scholars of hadith.
- Historical report: biographies and histories (Ibn Ishaq, Ibn Sa'd, al-Tabari) record events with chains that are often incomplete. They are used for the story, not for rulings.
- Hadith scholars grade a narration; the four madhhabs do not. Where a hadith carries a ruling, the page shows which schools act on it.
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