The Reward of His Wives for choosing to stay with the Messenger

More than one of the scholars, such as Ibn `Abbas, Mujahid, Ad-Dahhak, Qatadah, Ibn Zayd, Ibn Jarir and others stated that this Ayah was revealed as a reward to the wives of the Prophet expressing Allah's pleasure with them for their excellent decision in choosing Allah and His Messenger and the Home of the Hereafter, when the Messenger of Allah ﷺ, gave them the choice, as we have stated above. When they chose the Messenger of Allah ﷺ their reward was that Allah restricted him to these wives, and forbade him to marry anyone else or to change them for other wives, even if he was attracted by their beauty -- apart from slave-girls and prisoners of war, with regard to whom there was no sin on him. Then Allah lifted the restriction stated in this Ayah and permitted him to marry more women, but he did not marry anyone else, so that the favor of the Messenger of Allah ﷺ towards them would be clear. Imam Ahmad recorded that `A'ishah, may Allah be pleased with her, said: "The Messenger of Allah ﷺ did not die until Allah permitted (marriage to other) women for him." It was also recorded by At-Tirmidhi and An-Nasa'i in their Sunans. On the other hand, others said that what was meant by the Ayah,

لاَّ يَحِلُّ لَكَ النِّسَآءُ مِن بَعْدُ

The pious life of the Holy Prophet ﷺ and the issue of polygamy

The enemies of Islam have always targeted the issue of polygamy, specially the number of the wives of the Holy Prophet ﷺ for their criticism. But if the whole life of the Holy Prophet ﷺ is kept in view, even the Satan cannot find scope to cast doubts on the character of the Holy Prophet ﷺ . It is a proved fact that his first marriage at the age of twenty-five was with Sayyidah Khadijah 4.U1 who was an aged widow with children and had been married twice before. The Holy Prophet ﷺ spent his whole prime of life, upto the age of fifty, with that aged wife only. All these fifty years were spent right before the eyes of the people of Makkah who had started his opposition when he was of forty years and had announced his prophethood. His opponents did not leave any stone unturned in harassing and stigmatizing him. They called him a magician, a poet, a mad man, but no enemy could ever find a single chance to cast doubts in his piety, modesty or purity.