What can we learn from Khadijah, the Prophet's ﷺ first wife, as a businesswoman?

Khadijah bint Khuwaylid was a highly successful and respected merchant in pre-Islamic Makkah, managing a large trading business that sent caravans to Syria and employed several men to conduct trade on her behalf in exchange for a share of the profits — the Prophet Muhammad ﷺ himself worked for her in this capacity before their marriage, impressing her with his honesty and skill. Impressed by his character, Khadijah proposed marriage to him through an intermediary, and he accepted, itself an early example of a woman exercising agency in choosing her own spouse. Fifteen years his senior and independently wealthy, she used her resources and social standing to support the earliest years of Islam, providing the financial security that allowed the Prophet ﷺ to devote himself to worship and, later, to withstand the economic boycott placed on the Muslims by the Makkan tribes. She was also the very first person to accept Islam after the Prophet ﷺ received revelation, and he later described her among the greatest women, alongside figures such as Maryam, mother of Jesus (Sahih al-Bukhari 3432). Khadijah's life stands as an early, authoritative model of female entrepreneurship, independence, and leadership within Islamic history.

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