Asma bint Marwan


ʻAṣmāʼ bint Marwān was a female Arab poet who lived in Medina in 7th-century Arabia. Bint Marwan was known for ridiculing the people of Medina for obeying a chief not of their own kind.

Islamic sources

Family and death

The story of Asma bint Marwan and her death appears in the works of both Ibn Ishaq and Ibn Sa'd. According to the accounts, her family viewed Muhammad and his followers as unwelcome interlopers in Medina. After the Muslim victory over the Quraysh in Mecca in 624 in the Battle of Badr, a number of Muhammad's opponents were killed. In response, she composed poems that publicly criticized the local tribesmen who converted to Islam and allied with Muhammad, calling for his death. In her poems, she also ridiculed Medinians for obeying a chief not of their kin.
Ibn Ishaq mentions that bint Marwan also displayed disgust after the Medinian Abu Afak was killed for inciting rebellion against Muhammad. The poem said: "do you expect good from after the killing of your chiefs" and asked: "Is there no man of pride who would attack him by surprise/ And cut off the hopes of those who expect aught from him?" Upon hearing the poem, Muhammad then called for her death in turn, saying "Who will rid me of Marwan's daughter?" Umayr bin Adiy al-Khatmi, a blind man belonging to the same tribe as Asma bint Marwan's husband, Banu Khatma, responded that he would. He crept into her room in the dark of night where she was sleeping with her five children, with her infant child close to her bosom. Umayr removed the child from Asma's breast and killed her.
On the other hand Al-Waqidi's and Ibn Sa'd's accounts differ substantially from that of Ibn Ishaq. In these the killing of Asma bint Marwan does not stem from a statement by Muhammad as he is described as being in Badr during this time and not in Medina. Instead, according to al-Waqidi, a man named ʿUmayr bin ʿAdī, decided individually to kill Asma bint Marwan.

Ibn Ishaq's account

collected oral traditions about the life of Muhammad, some of which survive through the writings of Ibn Hisham and Ibn Jarir al-Tabari.

Ibn Sa'd's account

This account is found in Ibn Sa'd's Kitāb al-ṭabaqāt al-Kubrā and is given the rank of Mawḍūʻ, fabricated, by hadith scholars including Al-Albani, Majdi, and Al-Jawzi.

Hadith Scholar views on the authenticity of the story

Classical and post-classical hadith scholars have rejected the story, declaring it as fabrication. They point out in their arguments against the factuality of the incident that the chains of transmission by which the story was transmitted are all weak of the lowest degree.

Ibn Ishaq's narrative

's Sīratu Rasūlu l-Lāh, an important early work of sīra, was composed over 100 years after the Prophet's death, using oral traditions passed down from his early followers. However, its accuracy for use as hadith, a body of traditions of the prophet that Muslim scholars use to flesh out Islamic doctrine, is not completely accepted. This particular story has been challenged by Muslim scholars for having a weak chain of transmitter, Muhammad Ibn Al-Hajjaj and Mujalid ibn Sa’ed both who have been reputed by Al-Bukhari as weak transmitters in Tareekh Sagheer: Imam Bukhari.
Ibn Ishaq's version of the story has a number of chains of transmission that go back to Ibn ‘Abbas, a companion of Muhammad. As all these isnads belong to kayrawani sanads which make up Mudawana whose significance had since diminished after Cordoba and Kawrayan were not learning centers anymore lost its popularity and had their authenticity questioned by scholars of other fiqhs.
Muhammad ibn al-Hajjaj al-Lakhmi has been accused by hadith scholars of fabricating hadiths. Ibn ʻAdī stated: "...this isnad is not narrated on authority of Mujalid but by Muhammad ibn al-Hajjaj al-Lakhmi and they all accuse Muhammad Ibn Al-Hajjaj of forging it". Ibn al-Jawzi said something similar in his Al-'ilal.
Regarding Al-Lakhmi, Al-Bukhari said: "his hadith is abandoned", Yahya ibn Ma'een said: "compulsive liar" and once said: "not trustworthy". Al-Daraqutni denounced him as a liar.

Ibn Sa'd's & Al-Waqidi's narrative

declared Ibn Sa'd's chain of transmission to be weak as well, as it includes Al-Waqidi:
Al-Waqidi has been condemned as an untrustworthy narrator and has been frequently and severely criticized by scholars, thus his narrations have been abandoned by the majority of hadith scholars. Yahya ibn Ma'een said: "Al-Waqidi narrated 20,000 false hadith about the prophet". Al-Shafi'i, Ahmad ibn Hanbal and Al-Albani said: "Al-Waqidi is a liar" while Al-Bukhari said he didn't include a single letter by Al-Waqidi in his hadith works.
In addition, this isnad is discontinued as Al-Harith ibn al-Fudayl never met any of Muhammad's companions.

Modern Assessments

and Hartwig Hirschfeld state in Jewish Encyclopedia that “Some Moslem traditionists, in order to excuse the murder, make Asma a Jewess. It is, however, very doubtful that she was one, although Grätz accepts this assertion as a fact.”
V. J. Ridgeon sees certain parallels between Khomeini's declaration of the fatwa against Salman Rushdie and the incident of Asma bint Marwan's assassination.
Jane Smith, in her detailed study points at the high influence of poets and poetry at the time of Muhammad in Arabia. She states that assassinations of poets such as Asma, Abu Afak, and those who were killed after Muhammad's final victory, were the result of Muhammad's fears of "their continuing influence". "This constitutes interesting testimony of the power of their position, as well as of the recited words".
Antonio Elorza, historian and professor at Complutense University of Madrid, reviews Asma's assassination and similar cases. He believes that eliminating political opponents by any and all means possible was a common practice during Muhammad's time. Elorza asserts that the psychological effect of such actions by Mohammad cannot be ignored when studying the background of terrorism in Islam.
Contemporary Muslim writers respond to these charges by stating that on top of the stories of both Asma bint Marwan and Abu Afak being graded as weak and fabricated by the majority of Islamic scholars in history, even in the hypothetical stories these two individuals were not simply mocking but also instigating violence against the Muslims and the Prophet Muhammad. "They were inciting their people to rise up to fight and kill the Muslim population, and this made them direct enemy combatants." This falls in the general understanding of the conflict between the non-Muslim Meccans of Quraysh and the Muslims who would migrate to the city of Medina for safety in order to escape from the oppression of the non-Muslim Meccans.