They said to 'A'ishah: "We do not know.

They said to 'A'ishah: "We do not know. Maybe the verdict of the Prophet has been given only in the case of Salem, the slave-girl of Abu_Hudhayfah and his adopted son, and it is not applicable to others."(308) This incident has been narrated in Sahih of Muslim within six traditions, the last of which in his own words is as follows: They said to 'A'ishah: "By God! We consider the matter of Salim as a leave given by the Prophet to him only.

Therefore we cannot in that way allow anyone to become intimately related to us. (309) Salim ibn 'Abd Allah ibn 'Umar was one of those who, in adulthood, was allowed by means of suckling to visit 'A'ishah.

The author of Tabaqat writes: 'A'ishah sent Salem to her sister Umm Kulthum, wife of 'Abd Allah ibn Rabi' ah to be given suck, so that he would legitimately be allowed to visit her and listen to some tradition.(310) The next tradition, which is narrated by Muslim in his Sahih, confirms the opinion of Umm Salamah and other wives of the Prophet in the question of suckling. 'A'ishah says: One say the Prophet came in and saw a man sitting before me.

He was annoyed and I could observe signs of anger on his face. I told him that the man was my foster brother. He made a remark (311) which is explained as follow by an-Nawawi, a famous interpreter of tradition in Sahih of Muslim: It means: You must reflect to see whether this sucking has been effected in accordance with the required condition and laws of Islam or not.

For, sucking is due to hunger, and the legitimacy of the glance is due to the face that the child is so young that his hunger is satisfied through sucking without needing any other food, whereas in the case of grown-ups milk alone would not serve as an adequate food, and they required some other food, too. Therefore, not every person who suckles the milk of a mother maybe regarded as her foster offspring, or a foster brother of her children.

Thus the above legitimate intimacy can be obtained only by giving suck to a small baby. In at-Tirmidhi's tradition there is a sentence which means: Only that kind of sucking creates legitimacy of intimacy as a relative and bans marriage when the milk serves as the only food for the baby. Therefore its period is confined to the normal period of sucking in a baby.