" It was she who proposed, quite simply because he could not. Especially after abu-Talib’s rebuff, he would not have dared take the initiative. Khadija was from the powerful Asad clan, which made her eminently marriageable. Her suitors included the wealthiest merchants in Mecca, all of them offering large gifts to her father as a way of sweetening the deal. Except that Khadija, unlike abu-Talib’s young daughter, refused to be auctioned off. She had no need for another conventional marriage; this time she would defy convention by marrying the man she chose, not the one chosen for her. So as ibn-Ishaq tells it, adding “so the story goes” in acknowledgment of the oddly stilted language, she said: “I like you, Muhammad, because of our relationship and your high reputation for trustworthiness and good character and truthfulness,” and asked him to be her husband. "

― Lesley Hazleton , The First Muslim: The Story of Muhammad