The four best women of Paradise, and how each of them chose Allah.
The Prophet ﷺ named four women as the best of all the women of Paradise. Two lived before him, and two were from his own family.
One was a queen who lived in a palace with the worst of tyrants. One grew up in the house of Allah. One was the first person to believe in the Prophet ﷺ, and one was his beloved daughter. Each of them was tested, and each of them chose Allah.
"The best of the women of Paradise are Khadijah bint Khuwaylid, Fatimah bint Muhammad, Maryam bint Imran, and Asiyah bint Muzahim, the wife of Pharaoh."
Musnad Ahmad 2668
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Asiyah bint Muzahim
The queen who chose Allah over a palace
آسِيَةُ بِنْتُ مُزَاحِم
Asiyah was the wife of Pharaoh, the cruel king of Egypt who claimed to be a god. She lived in a palace with everything this world could offer.
When the baby Musa was found floating in a basket on the river, it was Asiyah who saved him. She said to Pharaoh: "A comfort of the eye for me and for you. Do not kill him. Perhaps he will benefit us, or we may adopt him as a son" (al-Qasas 28:9). So the prophet who would one day stand against Pharaoh grew up in Pharaoh's own house.
Asiyah believed in Allah, and she held on to her faith even though it meant standing against her husband, the most powerful man in the land. She asked Allah for something greater than any palace.
Allah gives her as an example for all the believers in the Qur'an. The Prophet ﷺ said that many men reached perfection, but among women only Maryam and Asiyah, the wife of Pharaoh (Sahih al-Bukhari 3411).
Before Maryam was born, her mother promised her baby to the service of Allah. Allah accepted her and she grew up in the care of the prophet Zakariyya, worshipping in the house of Allah. Whenever Zakariyya came to her prayer place, he found food with her. When he asked where it came from, she said: "It is from Allah. Allah gives to whom He wills without limit" (Al Imran 3:37).
The angels came to her and said: "O Maryam, Allah has chosen you and purified you, and chosen you above the women of the worlds" (Al Imran 3:42).
Allah gave her the gift of a son, 'Isa, without a father, as a sign for all people. In the pain of giving birth, alone, she was told to shake the trunk of the palm tree, and fresh ripe dates fell for her, with a stream of water below (Maryam 19:23-26).
She is the only woman named in the Qur'an, and a whole surah carries her name. Allah describes her as one who believed in the words of her Lord and was devoutly obedient (at-Tahrim 66:12).
Khadijah was a respected and successful businesswoman of Makkah, known for her noble character. She married the Prophet ﷺ fifteen years before revelation began, and they were married for about twenty-five years.
When the first revelation came in the Cave of Hira, the Prophet ﷺ came home shaking and said: "Cover me." Khadijah comforted him and said: "By Allah, Allah will never disgrace you. You keep good relations with your family, you help the weak, you give to the poor, you are generous to guests, and you help people in times of need" (Sahih al-Bukhari 3). She became the very first person to believe in him.
She stood by him and spent her wealth for Islam through the hardest years in Makkah. Jibril came to the Prophet ﷺ and told him to give Khadijah salam from her Lord and from Jibril, and to give her the good news of a house in Paradise made of hollow pearl, where there is no noise and no tiredness (Sahih al-Bukhari 3820).
She passed away about three years before the Hijrah. The Prophet ﷺ never stopped loving her. He would remember her often and send gifts to her friends long after she was gone (Sahih al-Bukhari 3818).
"Give her the good news of a house in Paradise made of hollow pearl, in which there is no noise and no tiredness."
Sahih al-Bukhari 3820
Support the people you love when they need it most. Your kindness may be the comfort they remember forever.
Fatimah was the youngest daughter of the Prophet ﷺ and Khadijah. She looked like her father, and she even walked like him (Sahih al-Bukhari 3623). When she came to visit, he would stand up, welcome her and sit her in his place.
She married Ali ibn Abi Talib and lived a simple, hard-working life. Her hands became sore from grinding grain, so she went to ask her father for a servant. Instead, he taught her and Ali something better: to say SubhanAllah 33 times, Alhamdulillah 33 times and Allahu Akbar 34 times before sleeping (Sahih al-Bukhari 3705).
The Prophet ﷺ said: "Fatimah is a part of me" (Sahih al-Bukhari 3714). In his last illness he whispered to her that he would soon pass away, and she cried. Then he whispered that she would be the first of his family to join him, and that she would be the leader of the women of Paradise, and she smiled (Sahih al-Bukhari 3624).
She was the mother of al-Hasan and al-Husayn, and she passed away about six months after her father.
Told from the Qur'an and authentic hadith, with references. A few details come from the books of seerah and are marked as such. The pictures show places and things, never people. May Allah be pleased with them all.
