Khadija by Resit Haylamaz

'At the time Khadija was born, Hijaz was, in every sense of the word, living in the time of ignorance. However there were a few roses among the swamp where people found solstice and wisdom...... ' What irony in the statement, how can you have a completely ignorant society which produces some of the wisest men on earth?
If you can somehow bypass such stark assumption made by the author and keep focused on trying to gauge as much information as possible about one of the most allusive and neglected personalities of the Islamic faith then you might be able to get answers to some very important questions, like, why role did Hazrat Khadija play in protecting her husband in a very hostile atmosphere after his open declaration of the new faith. Could he have ever accomplished what he did without her ardent support? How many husbands are pulled right left and centre by wives pushing their own agenda, completely destroying all of their husband's dreams in the process. Her diminished and subdued role in the story of Islam has to be highlighted in order to tackle this very patriarchal attitude prevalent in the Islam of today. I also the concept of coming of a messiah is still pretty much an entity of all religions, the Hindus with their avatars, Muslims with Imam Mehdi, Christians and Jews with the messiah, so I understand the authors insistence that the Hijaz at that time was rampant with signs of the coming of a Prophet. The atmosphere described is very much similar to the one we have today, hence pretty normal I think.

Basically this book is a waste of time. The only revelation for me was that Hazrat Khadijah had already married twice and had kids from both earlier marriages before she got engaged to the Prophet.