The dosing of the Prophet during his illness

During the Prophet's last illness, some of his wives and women of the Muslims, among them Asma bint Umays, were with him, and al-Abbas was present. They agreed to give him a purgative, and al-Abbas said: I will give it to him. So they gave it to him. ¹

When he recovered he said: who did this to me? They said: your uncle. He said: this is a medicine that women brought from the direction of this land, and he pointed toward the land of Abyssinia. ² Al-Abbas said: we feared, Messenger of God, that you had pleurisy. He said: that is a disease God would never cast upon me. No one in the house is to be given the purgative except my uncle; and Maymuna was given it while she was fasting, as a punishment for what they had done to him. ²

• The report is from Ibn Ishaq with a chain to Aisha in her transmission; the word "it is said" does not appear in Ibn Hisham's text. ¹
• The phrase "that they should purge him" means the medicine is poured into the side of the mouth, as the editors of the edition explain. ¹