Muawiya when he visited Medina and paid her a
courtesy call. It was he who told the story, laconically
adding the famed comment that “there was never any
subject I wished closed that she would not open, or that I
wished opened that she would not close.” Even in forced
retirement, Aisha still commanded respect, however
grudging.
These were the years in which she did what retired
public ɹgures still do: in eʃect, she wrote her memoirs,
or at least dictated them. She told the stories of her life
with Muhammad, many of which are still enshrined as
hadith—the reports of Muhammad’s sayings and practice
that would form the sunna, taking second place in Islam
only to the Quran itself. Aisha told the stories again and
again, reɹning them each time, and if anyone pointed
out that her recollections sometimes contradicted one
another, she would take a tack familiar to modern
politicians. She had misspoken then, she would say, but
was speaking correctly now. Or in a still more familiar
tactic, she would simply deny ever having said whatever
it was she had said before.
Still, retirement did mellow even her. In the years after
Hasan’s death, with Muawiya clearly bent on turning
the caliphate into a monarchy, she seemed to regret her
role in taking arms against Ali. “I caused wrongdoing
after the Prophet,” she acknowledged, and steered clear
of politics, contenting herself with the constant ɻow of
visitors, the diplomatic courtesy visits, the gifts and