Ayyub

Here Allah tells us about His servant and Messenger Ayyub (Job) and how He tested him. These tests afflicted his body, his wealth and his children, until there was no part of his body that was healthy except his heart. Then he had nothing left in this world which he could use to help him deal with his sickness or the predicament he was in, besides his wife, who retained her devotion to him because of her faith in Allah and His Messenger. She used to work for people as a paid servant, and she fed and served him (Ayyub) for nearly eighteen years. Before that, he was very rich and had many children, being well off in worldly terms. All of that had been taken away until he ended up being thrown into the city dump where he stayed all this time, shunned by relatives and strangers alike, with the exception of his wife -- may Allah be pleased with her. She did not leave him, morning and evening, except for when she was serving people, then she would come straight back to him. When this had gone on for a long time, and things had gotten very bad, and the time allotted by divine decree had come to an end, Ayyub prayed to the Lord of the worlds, the God of the Messengers, and said:

أَنِّى مَسَّنِىَ الضُّرُّ وَأَنتَ أَرْحَمُ الرَّاحِمِينَ

In verse 44, it was said: خُذْ بِيَدِكَ ضِغْثًا (Take [ a bundle of ] thin twigs in your hand). This was said in the background when Sayyidna Ayyub (علیہ السلام) intended to fulfill the oath he had taken. But, as his wife had taken good care of him, and had done nothing to deserve being chastised (with one hundred strokes of some stick as sworn by him), Allah Ta’ ala, in His mercy, showed him the way-out as to how he could do it symbolically and still fulfill his oath (as in khulasa-e-Tafsir of Bayan-ul-Qur’ an).

Some issues relating to legal aspects of this event are being identified here.