Umm Habiba Ramla bint Abi Sufyan رضي الله عنها
A Marriage Conducted by a King — Daughter of the Prophet's ﷺ Greatest Enemy
"Allah has given you good news! Allah has given you good news!"
— Umm Habiba's reaction to news of her marriage proposal
🌿 Alone in a Strange Land
Umm Habiba (RA) was the daughter of Abu Sufyan — at the time one of the most determined enemies of Islam. She and her first husband had emigrated to Abyssinia to escape persecution, but her husband later abandoned Islam for Christianity, leaving her alone in a foreign land. Unable to return to her father — who was fighting the Muslims — she lived in isolation with her daughter, waiting on Allah's decree.
One day, a messenger from the Negus of Abyssinia knocked on her door: the Prophet ﷺ had asked for her hand in marriage. She was overjoyed beyond words, giving away her jewellery in gratitude and asking the messenger to repeat the news three times.
👑 A Royal Wedding Conducted by the Negus
The marriage was conducted in the palace of the Negus, who personally addressed the gathering, declared his faith in Allah and Muhammad ﷺ, and gave a dowry of four hundred gold dinars on the Prophet's ﷺ behalf. Khalid ibn Sa'id (RA) acted as her representative. The Negus even told everyone present to stay and eat — "for it is the practice of the prophets to serve food at marriages."
Six years later, Umm Habiba (RA) finally travelled to Madinah, where the Prophet ﷺ — newly returned victorious from Khaybar — warmly welcomed her.
Standing for Faith Over Family: When her father Abu Sufyan visited Madinah before still being a disbeliever, he went to sit on the Prophet's ﷺ blanket. Umm Habiba quickly removed it. He asked: "Am I too good for the bed, or is the bed too good for me?" She replied: "How can the enemy of Islam sit on the bed of the Holy Prophet?" It was only after Abu Sufyan embraced Islam that she accepted him as her father again — and fell in prostration when she heard he and her brother Muawiya had become Muslims.
🕊️ Her Devotion
Umm Habiba (RA) related that the Prophet ﷺ once told her: "A house will be built in the Garden for anyone who, in a day and a night, prays twelve voluntary rakats." She said: "I have never stopped doing this since I heard it from the Messenger of Allah ﷺ." She spent four years with the Prophet ﷺ and lived for another thirty-three years, dying at seventy-two in 44 AH.
May Allah be pleased with Umm Habiba — whose patience in isolation was rewarded with a marriage arranged across nations, and whose loyalty to Allah never wavered, even before her own father.
رضي الله عنها — May Allah be pleased with her