left the limit of childhood and her age grew great. Her mother said to him: 'She must be married in any case while she is in your life, so strive in her affair.' He said: 'Present to me everyone who proposes to her.' So, the matchmakers presented everyone who proposed to her, and he said to them: 'I do not want these.' They said to him: 'What then do you want?' He said to them: 'Seek for my daughter a man free from all defects, whose outward and inward are in one state. Let him be of beautiful face, clean skin, pleasant scents, generous nature, open-handed; he does not care of the secrets of the people, nor is a sin sought for any of his brothers. His descriptions are complete and his qualities are fine, such that no speaker has anything [negative] to say of him.' They said: 'Yes, we shall seek that, if Allah wills.'

They continued to ask and seek one in whom these descriptions were complete until a long time passed. One day he said to some of his friends: 'Is it not the wonder of wonders that I was provided a daughter for whom I seek an equal in this world but find not?' This speech reached a man in whom Allah had completed the traits the King sought. That man traveled to his presence and proposed to his daughter. He favored him by marrying her to him after he stayed testing him for a long time and saw no state in him he denounced. Then he married him to her. When he wanted to deliver her to him, he said to him: 'I want to take a covenant from you regarding her affair, tie a knot upon you, and bind you with an oath.' The man asked: 'In what?' He said: 'Various conditions.' He asked: 'What are they?' He said: 'The first is that you do not show her to anyone, near or far—not to a father or mother, nor to a brother or sister. No one shall be the person in charge of all her affairs but you. And that you fear Allah — Exalted Glory — and do not betray her in secret or in public.' He answered him in that, and he then delivered her to him. If this man wanted to marry his daughter to a man and requested of him these conditions I mentioned to you, then what of the one who wants to guide you to that in which is your salvation and your life? Shall he not test you and choose you?"