Umm Qirfa

Umm Qirfa was an elderly Arab woman contemporaneous to Muhammad, the prophet of Islam. She is said to have belonged to a pagan tribe named Banu Fazara at the valley of al-Qurra. The elderly woman was also said to be a chief of her clan, which was brutally killed when Muhammad and his followers raided and overpowered them. The attack took place almost six years after Muhammad’s Hijra (هِجْرَة Migration) to Medina in 622 AD. Traditional sources recount how Muhammad's companions tied Umm Qirfa to a pair of camels which, after being made to run in opposite directions, tore her body in half.

Umm Qirfa in the sirahs

Ibn Ishaq and Tabari

Ibn Ishaq, the first biographer of Muhammad, recounts the incident of the attack on the Banu Fazara as well the incident of her "cruel" execution in his Sirat Rasul Allah.

The "cruel' method used by Muhammad's warriors to kill Umm Qirfa is described in the history of al-Tabari.

Ibn Ishaq adds that Umm Qirfa's daughter, who had been spared and taken captive, was then presented as a bride to one of Muhammad's companions.

According to Ibn Ishaq, Umm Qirfa held a high position among her people; the Arabs said of her: "No man or woman with more power could have done any more than Umm Qirfa”. She was thus perhaps comparable in social status to Khadijah bint Khuwaylid, Muhammad’s first wife. Afterwards, Umm Qirfa was beheaded and her head was brought to Medina and presented to Muhammad as proof of her execution.^[1]

Some, citing Sahih Bukhari 9:88:219, have suggested that the motivation for the execution itself and dramatic mode of execution might have been a consequence of Zyad b. Harithah emulating Muhammad's inability to tolerate women in leadership roles in society, especially those in elite positions of leadership such as Umm Qirfa.^[2]

Authenticity

The first to report this murder was Ibn Ishaq followed by Tabari, two historians which more recent Muslim scholars are wont to view with suspicion when Muhammad is cast by them in what is today a negative light. While the highly edited version of Ibn Ishaq (by Ibn Hisham) does contain the mention of the killing of Umm Qirfa but not the brutal way in which she was killed, Tabari mentions both the killing and the manner in which it was carried out. Sahih sources (Bukhari and Muslim) are also silent regarding the details of Umm Qirfa's killing but nonetheless confirm the raid on Banu Fazara.

Still, Saifur Rahman al-Mubarakpuri, a widely-read modern day biographer of Prophet Muhammad, has also pointed out the Umm Qirfa incident in his work “The Sealed Nectar”. This book is highly regarded internationally and its Arabic version was awarded first prize by the Muslim World League, at the first Islamic Conference on Sirah, following a worldwide competition for a book on the Sirah Rasul Allah (life of Muhammad) in 1979. The occurrence of the event of Umm Qirfa's execution is still acknowledged today in respected Islamic scholarly publications and is by no means hotly contested in circles where traditional Shari'ah punishments, such as stoning and crucifixion, are universally accepted.

Umm Qirfa in the hadiths

The account found in “The Sealed Nectar” is derived from a Sahih Muslim Hadith in regards to the incident. Though somewhat descriptive, the Sahih Muslim Hadith does not mention the fate of Umm Qirfa. The accounts of the raid as given by both Ibn Ishaq and Tabari are consistent with each other, and are broadly confirmed by the hadith in Sahih Muslim. Though the details of Umm Qirfa's fate are not mentioned, her existence is apparently confirmed, and the details regarding the fate of her daughter are recounted in detail.

There is slight variation in the Sahih Muslim account, however, such variations are extremely common in hadith literature. In the hadith from Sahih Muslim, Abu Bakr is leading the raid in place of Zaid b. Harithah, who both Ibn Ishaq and Tabari describe as the leader. The remainder the account given almost entirely aligns with Ibn Ishaq and Tabari.

Modern perspectives and criticisms thereof

A deserved outcome

Some modern Muslim scholars, confronted with the negative light the incident of Umm Qirfa sheds on Muhammad's companions and potentially Muhammad himself, have felt the need to construe Umm Qirfa's execution as an act of retribution rather than an exercise of the Shari'ah-based permission to execute one's opponents following a successful Jihad.^[3]

The above quote reflects the claim made by some modern scholars and influential apologists by citing the books of Ibn Sa'd and Ibn Hisham. On the other hand, Ibn Ishaq says that the first event in the chronology was Zaid's raid on a place called Wadi-al-Qurra and then came a skirmish with Banu Fazara. Mubarakpuri (a 20th century author) suggests that Zaid was on a reconnaissance mission. Additionally, the Sahih sources do not even hint at any trading journey by Zaid. There is indeed a contradiction present in the accounts of the historians.

On this reading, where the killing of Umm Qirfa is usually justified rather than denied, the basic story is that after Zaid is hurt and some Muslims are killed by a pagan tribe, Zaid comes back for vengeance, kills 30 horsemen, kills Umm Qirfa brutally, and captures her beautiful daughter who is eventually given away as ransom.

That Salama says "I had not yet disrobed her" twice in Sahih Muslim 19:4345 indicates that disrobing a captive woman was common or at least acceptable. That Umm Qirfa's beautiful daughter escaped this fate as a result of political necessity, does little, it would seem, to rectify the moral standing of story.

The same Sahih hadith mentions that Abu Bakr first gave the girl to Salama as a prize, and in the context of Islamic sexual slavery, it can only be assumed that this was to be a sexual prize:

See Also

• The Genocide of Banu Qurayza

References