One area in which Ibn Hazm differs with the majority of scholars is that of whether there were in the past women prophets. He comes clearly in favour of that, and he names four women who were prophets, Mary, Sarah, Moses's mother and Asia bint Muzahim who was Pharaoh's wife. He defines prophethood as ‘the acquisition of certain, undoubted knowledge that cannot be acquired through personal endeavour or human experience.' Such knowledge must, then, come through God's revelation. These four women received such knowledge.
In the case of Mary, not only she spoke to Archangel Gabriel, but she is also mentioned with a group of prophets in the surah carrying her name. When these prophets have all been mentioned, God states: "These are the ones God has blessed with His favours among prophets, of Adam's progeny…" (19: 58) In the case of Sarah, she received information through a delegation of angels, and they gave her the ‘impossible' information that she would conceive despite being past menopause and having an old man for a husband. Moses's mother was told of what would happen to her infant son when she throws him in the Nile, and then picked up by God's enemy and his own enemy. The evidence in the case of Asia is the hadith describing her, along with Mary, as the only women who attained perfection.
Scholars who object to this view base their objection on the verse stating: "We have not sent before you any other than men who received our revelations." (16: 43) Ibn Hazm replies that the verse speaks of messengers, not prophets. A messenger is a prophet who had a message to deliver. Not all prophets were messengers, while all messengers were prophets. He concurs that there were no women messengers.
