Al-Majlisi about the age at which A’ishah got married

Question:

What does the scholar Al-Majlisi say about the marriage age of A’ishah?

Answer:

Muhammad Baqir Al-Majlisi writes: “The messenger (s.) married Khadijah, the daughter of Khuwailid (a.), in Mecca. She was said to have been in marriage with Atiq Ibn A’idh Al-Makhzumi and then with Abu Halah, who was called Zurarah Ibn Nabbash Al-Usaidi. Ahmad Al-Baladhuri and Abu Al-Qasim Al-Kufi in their books and Al-Murtada in (the work) Ash-Shafi and At-Tusi in (the book) At-Takhlis narrated that the Prophet (s.) married her, whereby she was an virgin female person. This supports what was mentioned in the two books Al-Anwar and Al-Bida, namely that Ruqayyah and Zainab were the daughters of Halah, the sister of Khadijah, and he married Sawdah, the daughter of Zam’ah, a year after the death of Khadijah and she was in a marriage with As-Sakran Ibn Amr from the emigrants to Abyssinia, but he became a Nazarene and died on her and he married A’ishah, the daughter of Abu Bakr, two years before the emigration, when she was seven years old and it is said that she was six years old and he lived with her in Medina in the month of Shawwal, she was nine years old and beside her he did not take an virgin wife and as the Prophet (s. ) died, she was eighteen years old and remained alive until the government of Mu’awiyah, and she was approaching the age of seventy.” [Bihar-ul-Anwar, Volume 22 page 191].

قال محمد باقر المجلسي: تزوج بمكة أولا خديجة بنت خويلد قالوا وكانت عند عتيق بن عائذ المخزومي، ثم عند أبي هالة زرارة بن نباش الأسيدي وروى أحمد البلاذري وأبو القاسم الكوفي في كتابيهما والمرتضى في الشافي وأبو جعفر في التخليص أن النبي صلى الله عليه وآله تزوج بها وكانت عذراء، يؤكد ذلك ما ذكر في كتابي الأنوار والبدع أن رقية وزينب كانتا ابنتي هالة أخت خديجة وسودة بنت زمعة بعد موتها بسنة وكانت عند السكران بن عمرو من مهاجري الحبشة فتنصر ومات بها وعايشة بنت أبي بكر وهي ابنة سبع قبل الهجرة بسنتين ويقال كانت ابنة ست ودخل بها بالمدينة في شوال وهي ابنة تسع ولم يتزوج غيرها بكرا، وتوفي النبي صلى الله عليه وآله وهي ابنة ثمانية عشر سنة وبقيت إلى أمارة معاوية، وقد قاربت السبعين

Comment:

According to Al-Kafi, the Messenger (s) lived with A’ishah at the age of ten [Here!] However, the report is narrated by Ismail the son of Imam Sadiq (a) who did not witness the lifetime of Prophet Muhammad (s)  and neither is he infallible hence can not be taken as hujjah but only as probabilistic.