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Muhammad taught that women “have the right to their food and clothing in accordance with the custom.”<ref>{{Tabari|9|p. 112-113}}. See also {{Abudawud|11|2137}}.</ref> But he did not provide much food for Aisha, and she was always hungry. She was underweight because she so rarely ate meat.<ref>Guillaume/Ishaq 494; {{Muslim|37|6673}}.</ref> She claimed she never ate barley bread for more than three successive days. Sometimes the family did not light a fire for a month on end because they had nothing to cook but lived off dates and water.<ref>{{Muslim|42|7085}}; {{Muslim|42|7083}}; {{Muslim|42|7086}}; {{Muslim|42|7084}}; {{Muslim|42|7087}}; {{Muslim|42|7089}}; {{Muslim|42|7092}}; {{Muslim|42|7093}}; {{Muslim|42|7097}}; {{Muslim|42|7098}}.</ref> A neighbour once sent Aisha a pudding. While she was finishing her prayers, a cat came in and ate some of it, but she had no compunction in eating from the place that the cat had licked.<ref>{{Abudawud|1|76}}. This incident probably dates from after Aisha was widowed; but she maintained the habits she had learned from Muhammad.</ref>

Charity was a way of life for the Arabs, and of course the Prophet’s young wife had to set the example. In the early years, beggars sat on the Bench in the mosque courtyard waiting for food distribution.<ref>See, e.g., [http://www.answering-islam.org/Books/Muir/Life3/chap8.htm/ Muir (1861), pp. 20-21.]</ref> Aisha used to count them until Muhammad told her, “Give and do not calculate, [or else] calculation will be made against you.”<ref>{{Abudawud|9|1696}}.</ref> On one occasion a beggar came to her door on a fast-day, and Aisha told her maid to give him their only loaf. The servant protested that there would be nothing to break their fast, but Aisha insisted.<ref>{{Muwatta|58|1|5}}.</ref> On another occasion, a widow with two daughters came begging, and Aisha’s larder was reduced to one date. She handed it over, and the widow divided it between the children without taking anything for herself.<ref>{{Muslim|32|6362}}; {{Bukhari|8|73|24}}.</ref> Ibn Kathir, writing 700 years after the event, cited an old tradition when: “The Prophet had sacrificed an animal, and Ayesha was so generous in sharing the meat out amongst the poor that she found that she had left nothing for the Messenger’s large household except the shoulder of the animal. Feeling a little distressed, she went to the Prophet, and said, ‘I’ve only been able to save this.’ ‘That is the only part that you have not saved,’ smiled the Prophet, ‘for whatever you give away in the name of Allah, you save, and whatever you keep for yourself, you lose.’”<ref>[http://www.islamawareness.net/Muhammed/ibn_kathir_wives.html/ Ibn Kathir, ''The Wives of the Prophet Muhammad (SAW)''].</ref> The shoulder was Muhammad’s favourite part of the sheep.<ref>Guillaume/Ishaq 516</ref>