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Books
Section
> Introduction to the Study of Hadith by Maulana
Muhammad Ali
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Introduction
to the Study of Hadith:
by Maulana Muhammad
Ali
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Table
of Contents:
Chapter
1: Origin and Growth of Hadith
Literature:
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Sunnah and Hadith
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Transmission of Hadith in
Prophet's Lifetime
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Writing of Hadith in Prophet's
Lifetime
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Why Hadith was not Written
Generally
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Memory could be Trusted for
Preservation of Knowledge
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Collection of Hadith: First Stage
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Collection of Hadith: Second
Stage
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Collection of Hadith: Third Stage
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Collection of Hadith: Fourth
Stage
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Collection of Hadith: Fifth Stage
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Bukhari
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Chapter
2: Criticism of
Hadith:
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Method of Counting Different
Reports
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Reports in Biographies and
Commentaries
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Storytellers
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European Criticism of Hadith
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Canons of Criticism of Hadith as
Accepted by Muslims
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How far did the Muhaddithin Apply
these Tests
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Different Classes of Hadith
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Chapter
1: ORIGIN AND GROWTH OF HADITH
LITERATURE:
Sunnah and
Hadith:
Sunnah or Hadith
is admittedly the second source — and undoubtedly a
secondary one — from which the teachings of Islam are
drawn. Sunnah literally means a way or rule
or manner of acting or mode of life, and
Hadith literally means a saying conveyed to man
either through hearing or through revelation. [Hence
the Holy Quran is also spoken of as Hadith (18:6;
39:23.) The word sunnah is used in the Holy Quran in
a general sense meaning a way or rule. Thus
sunnat-ul-awwalin (8: 38; 15: 13; 18: 55; 35: 43)
means the way or example of the former people and is
frequently used in the Holy Quran as signifying God's way of
dealing with people, which is also spoken of as sunnat
ullah or God's way. Once, however, the plural sunan
is used as indicating the ways in which men ought to
walk: "God desires to explain to you, and to guide you into
the ways (Ar. Sunan) of those before you" (4:
26).] In its original sense, therefore, Sunnah
indicates the practice, and Hadith the sayings, of
the Holy Prophet; but practically both cover the same ground
and are applicable to his actions, practices, and sayings,
Hadith being the narration and record of the
Sunnah, but containing in addition some prophetical
and historical elements. Sunnah is divided into three
kinds. It may be a qaul, that is, an utterance
or a saying of the Holy Prophet which has a bearing on a
religious question; a fi‘l, that is, his
action or practice; or a taqrir, that is, his silent
approval of the action or practice of another. Anyone who
studies the Quran will see that the Holy Book generally
deals with the broad principles or essentials of religion,
going into details in very rare cases. The details were
generally supplied by the Holy Prophet, by either showing in
his practice how an injunction was to be carried out or by
giving an explanation in words. The Sunnah or
Hadith of the Holy Prophet was not a thing of which
the need may have been felt after his death, as is generally
supposed; it was as much needed in his lifetime. The two
most important religious institutions of Islam, for
instance, are salat (prayer) and zakat
(compulsory charity). Yet when the injunctions relating
to them were given, and they are repeatedly met with both in
Mecca and Medina revelations, no details were given.
Aqimu al-salata (or keep up prayers) is the Quranic
injunction, and it was the Prophet who by his action gave
the details of the service. Atuz al-zakah (or
pay the zakat) is again an injunction frequently
repeated in the Holy Quran, yet it was the Holy Prophet who
gave the rules and regulations for its payment and
collection. These are only two examples. As Islam covers the
whole sphere of human activities, hundreds of points had to
be explained by the Holy Prophet by his example, action and
word. On the moral side, he was the exemplar whom every
Muslim was required to follow (33:21). The man who embraced
Islam, therefore, stood in need of both the Holy Quran and
the Sunnah.
Transmission of
Hadith in Prophet's Lifetime:
The transmission of the
practices and sayings of the Holy Prophet from one person to
another thus became necessary during the Prophet's lifetime.
In fact, the Holy Prophet himself used to give instructions
with regard to the transmission of what he taught. Thus when
a deputation of the Rabi'a came to wait upon him in the
early days of Medina, the Prophet concluded his instructions
to them with the words: "Remember this and report it to
those whom you have left behind" (Mish. I. i.). Similar were
his instructions in another case: "Go back to your people
and teach them these things" (Bkh. 3: 25). There is another
report according to which on the occasion of a pilgrimage,
the Holy Prophet after enjoining on the Muslims the duty of
holding sacred each other's life, property and honour, added
: "He who is present here should carry this message to him
who is absent" (Bkh. 3:37). Again, there is ample historical
evidence that whenever a people embraced Islam, the Holy
Prophet used to send to them one or more of his missionaries
who not only taught them the Holy Quran but also explained
to them how the injunctions of the Holy Book were carried
out in practice. It is also on record that people came to
the Holy Prophet and demanded teachers who could teach them
the Quran and the Sunnah: "Send us men to teach us
the Quran and the Sunnah" (Mus. Ch. Imara).
And the companions of the Holy Prophet were fully aware that
his actions and practices were to be followed in case an
express direction was not met with in the Holy Quran.
Tirmidhi and Abu Dawud relate that when Mu'adh ibn Jabal was
appointed governor of Yemen by the Holy Prophet, and was
asked as to how he would judge cases, his reply was "by the
Book of God." Asked again if he did not find a direction in
the Book of God, he replied, "by the Sunnah of the
Apostle of God." The Sunnah was therefore recognised
as affording guidance in religious matters in the life-time
of the Holy Prophet.
Writing of
Hadith in Prophet's Lifetime:
The popular idea in the West
that the need for Sunnah was felt, and that
Hadith was given the force of law, after the death of
the Holy Prophet is falsified by the above facts. [Thus
Muir writes in his introduction to The Life of
Mahomet: "The Arabs, a simple and unsophisticated race,
found in the Quran ample provisions for their affairs,
social and political. But this aspect of Islam soon
underwent a mighty change. Scarcely was the Prophet buried
when his followers issued forth from their barren Peninsula
resolved to impose the faith of Islam upon all the nations
of the earth….Crowded cities, like Cufa, Cairo and
Damascus, required elaborate law for the guidance of their
courts of justice: widening political relations demanded a
system of international equity. ...All called loudly for the
enlargement of the scanty and naked dogmas of Revelation.
...The difficulty was resolved by adopting the custom
(Sunnah) of Mahomet; that is his sayings and his
practice as supplementary of the Quran. Tradition was thus
invested with the force of law, and with some thing of the
authority of inspiration" (p. xxix). And even a recent
writer, Guillaume, writes in The Traditions of Islam:
"While the Prophet was alive he was the sole guide in all
matters whether spiritual or secular. Hadith, or
tradition in the technical sense, may be said to have begun
at his death" (p. 13).] Nor was the preservation of what
the Prophet did or said an afterthought on the part of the
Muslims. The companions of the Holy Prophet while
translating into practice most of his sayings also tried to
preserve them in memory as on paper. The need of the
Sunnah, its force as law and its preservation, are
all traceable to the lifetime of the Holy Prophet. A special
importance was attached from the first to his sayings and
deeds which were looked upon as a source of guidance by his
followers. They were conscious of the fact that these things
must be preserved for the future generations. Hence they not
only preserved them in memory but even resorted to pen and
ink for their preservation. Abu Hurairah tells us that when
one of the Ansar complained to the Holy Prophet of his
inability to preserve in his memory what he heard from him,
the Prophet's reply was that he should seek the help of his
right hand, that is, should write them down (Tr. 39,
Gh. Al-Rukhsa fi Kitabat-i -'ilm). This
Hadith exists in many forms. Another well-known
report is from 'Abdullah ibn 'Amr: "I used to write
everything that I heard from the Holy Prophet, intending to
commit it to memory. (On some people taking objection to
this) I spoke about it to the Prophet who said, ‘Write
down, for I only speak the truth’" (AD. 24, ch.
Khabat-ul-ilm). This Hadith is very
well-known and exists in thirty different forms with small
differences Still again, there is another report from Abu
Hurairah: "None of the companions preserved more
Hadith than myself, but 'Abdullah ibn 'Amr is an
exception; he used to write and I did not write" (Bkh. 3:
39). Anas ibn Malik states that Abu Bakr wrote down for him
the laws regarding alms (Bkh. 3: 39). 'Ali had also a saying
of the Prophet with him in writing (Bkh. 3: 39). In the year
of the conquest of Mecca, the Holy Prophet delivered a
sermon on the occasion of a man being killed by way of
retaliation for some old grievance. When the sermon was
finished, a man from among the people of Yemen came forward
and requested the Holy Prophet to have the same written down
for him, and the Prophet gave orders to that effect (Bkh.
3:39). These reports show that while generally Hadith
was preserved in memory, it was occasionally, when there
was a need for it, reduced to writing. The last-mentioned
incident affords the clearest testimony that whatever the
companions heard from the lips of the Holy Prophet, they
tried to preserve in memory, for how else could an order be
given for the writing of a sermon which had been delivered
orally?
Why Hadith
were not Generally Written:
It is however a fact that the
sayings of the Holy Prophet were not generally written, and
memory was the chief means of their preservation. The Holy
Prophet is reported to have sometimes not liked the writing
down of Hadith. Thus Abu Hurairah is reported to have
said: "The Prophet of God came to us while we were writing
Hadith and said, What is this that you are writing?
We said, Hadith which we hear from thee. He said,
What, a book other than the Book of God?" Now the
disapproval in this case clearly states that it was due to
the fear of Hadith being mixed up with the Holy
Quran. There was nothing essentially wrong in writing down
Hadith, nor did the Holy Prophet ever give an
interdict against its writing. On the other hand, as late as
the conquest of Mecca, we find that the Prophet himself gave
orders for the writing down of a certain Hadith at
the request of a hearer. He also wrote letters, and treaties
were also put down in writing. This shows that he never
meant that the writing of anything besides the Quran was
illegal. What he feared, as the report clearly shows, was
that if his sayings were written down generally like the
Quran, the two may be mixed up, and the purity of the text
of the Holy Quran may thus be affected.
Memory could be
Trusted for Preservation of
Knowledge:
Nor was memory an unreliable
means for the preservation of Hadith. Even the Holy
Quran was safely preserved in the memory of the companions
of the Holy Prophet in addition to being guarded in writing.
In fact, if the Holy Quran had been simply preserved in
writing, it could not have been handed down intact to the
future generations. The aid of memory was invoked to make
the purity of the text of the Quran doubly sure. And the
Arab had a wonderfully retentive memory. He had to store up
the knowledge of numerous things in his memory. The
beautiful poetry of the pre-Islamic days had been kept
intact in memory. In fact, before Islam writing was only
rarely resorted to, and memory was chiefly relied on in all
important matters. Hundreds and even thousands of verses
could be recited from memory by one man. And the reciters
would also remember the names of the persons through whom
those verses were transmitted to them. Asma'i, a later
transmitter, says that he learned twelve thousand verses by
heart before he reached the age of majority. About Abu
Damdam, Asma'i says that he recited verses from a hundred
poets in a single sitting. Shi'bi says that he knew so many
verses by heart that he could continue repeating them for a
month. And these verses were the basis of Arabic lexicology
and even of Arabic grammar. Among the companions of the Holy
Prophet there were many who knew thousands of the verses of
pre-Islamic poetry by heart. One of them was 'Aishah, the
Prophet's wife. The famous Bukhari trusted memory alone for
the retention of as many as six hundred thousand
hadith, and many students corrected their manuscripts
by comparing them with what he retained only in
memory.
Collection of
Hadith: First Stage:
The first steps for the
preservation of Hadith were thus taken in the
lifetime of the Holy Prophet. [Thus Guillaume
writes in The Traditions of Islam: "The Hadith
last quoted do not invalidate the statements that
traditions were written down from the mouth of the Prophet;
the extraordinary importance attached to every utterance of
his would naturally lead his followers who were able to
write to record his words in order to repeat them to those
who clamoured to know what he said; and there is nothing at
all in any demonstrably early writing to suggest that such a
practice would be distasteful to Muhammad" (p.17).] All
his followers were not, however, equally interested in the
matter, nor had all equal chances. Everyone had to work for
his living, while the defence of the Muslim community
against overwhelming odds had placed an additional burden on
most of them. There was, however, a party of students called
the Ashab-ul-Suffa who lived in the mosque itself,
and who were specially prepared for the teaching of religion
to tribes outside Medina. Some of them would go to the
market and do a little labour to earn livelihood; others
would not care even for that. The most famous of these was
Abu Hurairah who would stick to the Prophet's company at all
costs, and store up in his memory the knowledge of what the
Holy Prophet said or did. His efforts were from the first
directed towards the preservation of Hadith. He
himself is reported to have said once: "You say Abu Hurairah
is profuse in narrating hadith from the Holy Prophet,
and you say, how is it that the Muhajirin (Refugees)
and the Ansar (Helpers) do not narrate hadith
from the Prophet like Abu Hurairah. The truth is that our
brethren from among the Refugees were occupied in
transacting business in the market and I used to remain with
the Holy Prophet having filled my belly, so I was present
when they were absent and I remembered what they forgot; and
our brethren from among the Helpers were occupied with work
in their lands, and I was a poor man from among the poor
inmates of the Suffa, so I retained what they forgot" (Bkh.
34: 1). Another companion, Talha, son of 'Ubaidullah, is
reported to have remarked about Abu Hurairah: "There is no
doubt that he heard from the Holy Prophet what we did not
hear. The reason was that he was a poor man who possessed
nothing and was therefore a guest of the Prophet" (Mk).
There is another report from Muhammad Ibn 'Ammara: "He sat
in a company of the older companions of the Holy Prophet in
which there were over ten men. Abu Hurairah began to relate
a certain saying of the Holy Prophet which some of them did
not know, so they questioned him over and over again
until they were satisfied. Again, he related to them a
saying in the same manner and he did this over and over
again, and I was convinced that Abu Hurairah had the best
memory" (Bq). Another report runs thus: "People used to say
in the lifetime of the Holy Prophet that Abu Hurairah
narrated many sayings of the Prophet. So Abu Hurairah
enquired of one of them as to which suras the Holy
Prophet had recited in his night prayers the day before. The
man being unable to answer the question. Abu Hurairah named
the suras" (Bkh. 21: 18). It shows not only that Abu
Hurairah had a wonderful memory but also that he tried to
preserve everything in his memory.
'A'ishah, the Prophet's wife, was also
one of those who tried to preserve the Sunnah of the
Prophet. She had a wonderful memory, and was in addition
gifted with a clear understanding, and she did not accept
anything which she did not understand. There is a report
about her according to which "she never heard anything she
did not recognise but she questioned about it again" (Bkh.
3: 35). In other words, she did not accept anything even
from the lips of the Holy Prophet until she was fully
satisfied. 'Abdullah ibn 'Umar and 'Abdullah ibn 'Abbas are
two other companions who were specially engaged in the work
of preserving and transmitting the knowledge of the Quran
and the Hadith, and so was 'Abdullah ibn 'Amr who was
in the habit of writing sayings of the Holy Prophet. And
besides those who were specially engaged in this work, every
companion of the Holy Prophet tried to preserve such of his
words and deeds as came to his knowledge. 'Umar who lived at
about three miles from Medina had made arrangements with a
neighbour of his to be in the company of the Holy Prophet on
alternate days, so that the one reported to the other what
happened in his absence. And most important of all, the Holy
Prophet had repeatedly laid an obligation on every one of
his followers to transmit his words to others. "Let him who
is present deliver to him who is absent" are the concluding
words of many of his important as utterances. All this
affords clear proof that the work of the preservation and
transmission of the Sunnah had begun in the lifetime
of the Holy Prophet, and this was the first stage in the
collection of Hadith.
Collection of
Hadith: Second Stage:
With the death of the Holy
Prophet, the work of the preservation of Sunnah and
of the collection of Hadith entered as on a second
stage. Every case that came for decision had now to be
referred either to the Holy Quran or to some judgment or
saying of the Holy Prophet, and such judgments or sayings
therefore obtained a wide reputation. There are a number of
cases on record in which a right was claimed on the basis of
a judgment or saying of the Holy Prophet, and evidence was
demanded as to the trustworthiness of that saying. [A
companion, Qabisa by name, reports that the grandmother of a
deceased person came to Abu Bakr and claimed a right in
inheritance. Abu Bakr said that he did not find for her any
share in the Book of God or the Sunnah of the
Prophet, and that he would make enquiries about it from
others. In this enquiry, Mughira gave evidence that the
Prophet gave the grandmother one-sixth of the property. Abu
Bakr asked him to bring another witness in support of it,
and Muhammad ibn Maslama appeared before Abu Bakr
corroborating the evidence of Mughira. Decision was
accordingly given in favour of the grandmother (Tr. 27, AD.
18, ch. Faraids). Again, Fatimah, the
Prophet's daughter, claimed that she was entitled to an
inheritance from the Holy Prophet. As against this, Abu Bakr
cited a saying of the Holy Prophet: "We prophets do not
leave an inheritance; whatever we leave is a charity." The
truth of this hadith was not questioned by anyone,
and Fatima's claim was rejected (Bkh. 85: 3). Such incidents
happened daily and became the occasion of sifting the truth
of many sayings of the Holy Prophet.] Thus there was a
double process at work; not only was the trustworthiness of
the particular hadith established beyond all doubt,
but such hadith also obtained a wide circulation, and
from the knowledge of one man it passed to that of many. The
particular judgment might not be on all fours with the
circumstances of the case, and an analogy might be sought
from one or more sayings. Thus the multiple needs of a
community which was increasing by leaps and bounds and
spreading far and wide and whose needs had increased tenfold
on account of its onward march to civilisation brought a
large number of hadith, which had been limited to one
or a few only, into the light of the day, setting the seal
of confirmation on their truth at the same time, because
direct evidence of this truth was available at that
time.
Yet this was not the only factor that
gave impetus to a dissemination of the knowledge of
Hadith. The influx into Islam of a large number of
people who had not seen the Holy Prophet himself but who
could easily witness the wonderful transformation brought
about by him, and to whom therefore his memory was sacred in
the highest degree, was in itself an important factor that
brought about a search of what the great man had said or
done. It was natural that every new convert should be
anxious to know everything about the great Prophet who had
given quite a new life to a dead world. Everyone who had
seen him would thus be a centre to whom hundreds of
enquirers would resort, and as the incidents were so fresh
in the memories of those who had seen him, these were
intimated with fair accuracy to the new generation. It must
be borne in mind that the wonderful success which Islam
achieved within so short a time, and the rapidity with which
the reputation of the Holy Prophet advanced, were the very
reasons which led to the preservation of facts about him.
Not only had he and his religion assumed an unparalleled
importance in Arabia within twenty years of the day on which
he began the work of a reformer, but within ten years of his
death they were the most important world factors and
everything relating to him was a matter of discussion among
the Arabs and the non-Arabs, among friends as well as foes.
If he himself remained in a corner of oblivion for a century
or so, and then rose to prominence, probably much of what he
said or did would have been lost to the world, and the
exaggerations of a later generation would have been handed
down to posterity instead of facts. But his case was quite
different. From the humblest position he had risen to the
highest eminence to which man can rise within less than a
quarter of a century, and therefore every incident of his
life had become public property before it could be
forgotten. Such were the needs of the new times upon which
Islam had entered after the death of the Holy
Prophet.
Apart from these there was another
factor of the utmost importance which gave impetus to the
knowledge of Hadith at this stage. To the companions
of the Holy Prophet, the religion which he had brought was a
priceless jewel; it was a thing which they valued above
everything else in the world. For its sake they had given up
their relations, their business, their very homes; to defend
it they had laid down their very lives; to carry this Divine
blessing, this greatest gift of God, to other people was the
very object of their lives. Hence a dissemination of its
knowledge was their first and foremost concern. In addition
to this, the Great Master had laid on those who saw him and
listened to his words the duty of carrying what they saw and
heard to those who came after him. Li-yubaligh ul shahid
ul gha'iba was the phrase which on account of the
frequency of its repetition rang in their ears: Let him
who is present carry this to him who is absent. And they
were faithful to the great charge which was laid on them.
They went eastward and they went westward and they went
northward, and in whichever direction they went, and to
whichever country they went, they carried the Quran and the
Sunnah. Every one of them who had the knowledge of
but one incident relating to the Prophet's life deemed it
his duty to deliver it to another. And individuals like Abu
Hurairah, 'A'ishah, 'Abdullah ibn 'Abbas, 'Abdullah ibn
'Umar, 'Abdullah ibn 'Amr, Anas ibn Malik and many others
who had made the preservation of Sunnah the very
object of their lives, had become as centres to whom people
resorted from different quarters of the kingdom of Islam to
get their knowledge of the Prophet and his religion. Their
places of residence became in fact so many colleges for the
dissemination of the knowledge of Hadith. Abu
Hurairah alone had eight hundred disciples. 'A'ishah's house
too was resorted to by hundreds of ardent pupils. The
reputation of 'Abdullah ibn 'Abbas was equally great, and,
notwithstanding his young age, he had a foremost place among
the counsellors of 'Umar on account of his knowledge of the
Quran and the Sunnah. Thus the residences of a large
number of the companions of the Holy Prophet became the
centres for the dissemination of religious learning. And
such was the zeal of the new generation for the possession
of religious knowledge that students would travel from one
place to another to complete their knowledge of the
Sunnah, and some of them would travel long distances
to obtain firsthand information about one hadith
only. [Bukhari (3: 19) records the case of
Jabir ibn 'Abdullah who travelled from Medina to Syria for
the sake of a single hadith. It was a month's
journey, as Jabir himself states. Bukhari's famous
commentary, Fath al-Bari, relates several incidents
of the same type. Abu Ayyub Ansari, for instance, is related
to have undertaken a long journey to hear a saying of the
Holy Prophet from 'Aqaba ibn 'Amir. Sa'id ibn Musayyab is
reported to have said that he used to travel for days and
nights in search of a single hadith. Another
companion of the Holy Prophet is said to have undertaken a
journey to Egypt for the sake of one hadith. The zeal
of the next generation was equally great. Abul 'Aliya is
reported to have said: "We heard of a hadith of the
Holy Prophet, but we were not satisfied until we went to the
companion concerned in person and heard it from him direct."
AD relates that Abu Darda was sitting in a mosque in
Damascus when a man came to him and questioned about a
hadith, saying at the same time that he had come for
no other object but the verification of a hadith
which he (Abu Darda) related.]
Thus arrangements existed for both,
the collection of the knowledge of Hadith in
different centres of learning and the spread of it far and
wide, through the disciples who gained their knowledge at
such centres.
Collection of
Hadith: Third Stage:
With the passing away of the
generation that had seen and heard the Holy Prophet
directly, the work of the collection of Hadith
entered upon a third stage. There were no more reports
to be searched from different persons, and the whole of
Hadith was now the property of the different teachers
who taught at different centres. There is no doubt that
there was no single centre at which the whole store of the
knowledge of Hadith could be obtained, for the
companions of the Holy Prophet had spread far and wide. But
in the second stage, Hadith had undoubtedly passed
from individual possession into public possession, and
therefore in the third stage the whole Hadith could
be learned by repairing to different centres instead of
searching it from different individuals. At this stage,
moreover, writing of the Hadith became more common.
The large number of the students of Hadith at the
different centres having abundance of material to digest, to
which was also added the difficulty of remembering the names
of the transmitters, sought the aid of the pen so that the
work might be easier. By this time writing had become
general and writing material could be obtained in abundance.
Moreover, there was now no fear of the Hadith being
mixed up with the Quran. It must, however, be borne in mind
that at this stage Hadith was written only as a help
to memory; the mere fact that a written hadith was
found in the manuscripts of a person was no evidence of its
trustworthiness which could only be established by tracing
it to a reliable transmitter. 'Umar ibn 'Abdul 'Aziz,
commonly known as 'Umar II, the Umayyad Caliph, who ruled
towards the close of the first century of Hijrah, was
the first man who issued definite orders to the effect that
written collections of Hadith should be made.
According to Bukhari (3 : 34), ‘Umar ibn 'Abdul
'Aziz wrote to Abu Bakr ibn Hazm : "See whatever saying of
the Holy Prophet can be found, and write it down, for I fear
the loss of knowledge and the disappearance of the learned
men; and do not accept anything but the Hadith of the
Holy Prophet; and people should make knowledge public and
should sit in companies so that he who does not know should
came to know, for knowledge does not disappear until it is
concealed from the public." [Guillaume thinks
that the issuing of orders by 'Umar II for the collection of
Hadith is a later invention. The reason given by him
is that no such collection has come down to us, nor is there
any mention of it in any other work. But as I have pointed
out, the reason for any such collection not being
made, if really it has not disappeared, was the shortness of
‘Umar's reign and the indifference of the other Umayyad
Caliphs. Another reason given is that the name of Ibn Shahab
al-Zuhri is connected with this order according to another
report. But this rather confirms the authenticity of 'Umar's
orders, because, as I have pointed out, the orders were
circular. Muir is right when he says: "About a hundred years
after Muhammad the Caliph ‘Umar II issued
circular orders for the formal collection of all extant
traditions. The task thus begun continued to be vigorously
prosecuted" (Int. to Life of Mahomet).] The
importance of this incident ties in the fact that the Caliph
himself took interest in the collection of Hadith,
the Umayyads generally having stood aloof in this great work
up to this time. Abu Bakr ibn Hazm was the Caliph's governor
at Medina, and there is evidence that similar letters were
written to other centres. But 'Umar II died after a short
reign of two and a half years, and his successor does not
seem to have taken any interest in the work. Even if a
collection was made in pursuance of these orders, which is
very doubtful, no copy has reached us. But the work was
taken up independently of government patronage in the next
century and this brings us on to the fourth stage in the
collection of Hadith.
Collection of
Hadith: Fourth Stage:
Before the middle of the
second century, Hadith began to assume a more
permanent shape, and written collections of Hadith
saw the light of the day. Hundreds of students of Hadith
were engaged in the work of learning it in different
centres, but with every new teacher and student the work of
preserving the name of the transmitter along with the
hadith itself was becoming stupendous. Written
collections of Hadith had thus become indispensable.
The first known work on the subject is that of Imam 'Abdul
Malik ibn' Abd-ul 'Aziz ibn Juraij. According to some,
however, Sa'id ibn Abi' Aruba or Rabi' ibn Suhaib has
precedence in the matter. All these authors died about the
middle of the second century. Ibn Juraij lived at Mecca.
Other authors who wrote books on Hadith in the second
century are Imam Malik ibn Anas and Sufyan ibn 'Uyaina in
Medina, 'Abdullah ibn Wahb in Egypt, Ma'mar and 'Abdul
Razzaq in Yemen, Sufyan Thauri and Muhammad ibn Fudzail in
Kufa, Hammad ibn Salma and Rauh ibn 'Ubada in Basra, Hushaim
in Wasit and 'Abdullah ibn Mubarak in Khurasan. By far the
most important of the collections of these authors is the
Muwatta of Imam Malik. All these books, however, were
far from being exhaustive writings on Hadith. In the
first place, the object of their compilation was simply the
collecting of such reports as related to the daily life of
the Muslims. Reports relating to a large number of topics,
such as faith or knowledge or the life of the Prophet or
wars or comments on the Quran were outside their scope. And
secondly, every author collected only such reports as were
taught at the centre at which he worked. Even the
Muwatta which, as far as reliability is concerned,
comes in the first rank with Bukhari and
Muslim, contains only the hadith which came
through the people of Hijaz. All these works on Hadith
were therefore incomplete, but they were a great advance
on oral transmission towards the work of the collection of
Hadith.
Collection of
Hadith: Fifth Stage:
The work of the collection of
Hadith was brought to completion in the third century
of Hijrah. It was then that two kinds of collections
of Hadith were made: the Musnad and the
Jami‘, or the Musannaf. The Musnad
was the earlier type and the Jami' the
later. Musnad is derived from sanad meaning
authority, and the isnad of a hadith
meant its tracing back through various transmitters to a
companion of the Holy Prophet on whose authority it rested.
The collections of Hadith known as Musnads
were arranged, not according to the subject matter of
the hadith, but under the name of the companion on
whose final authority the hadith rested. The most
important of the works of this class is the Musnad of
Imam Ahmad Hanbal which contains about thirty thousand
reports. Ahmad was born in 164 a.h. and died in 241 a.h. and
is one of the four recognised Imams. His collection,
however, contains reports of all sorts. It is to the
Jami‘i (lit. one that gathers together)
or the Musannaf (lit. compiled together)
that the honour belongs of bringing the knowledge of
Hadith to perfection. The Jami‘ not only
arranges reports according to the subject matter, but is
also more critical. Six books are recognised by the Ahl
Sunnah generally under this heading, being the
collections made by Muhammad ibn Isma'il, commonly known as
Bukhari (d. 256 A.H.), Muslim (d. 261 a.h.), Abu Dawud (d.
275 a.h.). Tirmidhi (d. 279 a.h.), Ibn Maja (d. 283 a.h) and
Nasa'i (d. 303 A. H.). The third and the last two are more
generally known by the name of Sunan (pl. of
sunnah). These books classified reports under
various heads, making Hadith easy for reference, not
only for the judge and the lawyer but also for the ordinary
and research student, and thus gave an impetus to the
knowledge of Hadith.
Bukhari:
It may be noted here that
among the six collections of Hadith, noted above, and
known as the Sihah Sitta, or the six reliable
collections, Bukhari holds the first place. [Muhammad
ibn Isma'il Bukhari was born at Bukhara in 194 a.h. He began
the study of Hadith when only eleven years of age,
and acquired a high reputation for his knowledge of
Hadith by the time that he was 16. He had a wonderful
memory and the students of Hadith used to correct
their manuscripts by comparing them with what he recited
from memory.] In several respects, while Muslim comes
second, the two together are known as the Sahihain or
the two reliable books. In the first place, Bukhari
has the unquestioned distinction of being first, all the
others modelling their writings on his. Secondly, he is the
most critical of all. [A modern writer, and one who has
made a special study of Hadith, expresses the
following opinion about Bukhari: "So far as one is able to
judge, Bukhari published the result of his researches into
the context of what he believed to be genuine tradition with
all the painstaking accuracy of a modern editor. Thus he
records even trifling variants in the hadith, and
wherever he feels that an explanatory gloss is necessary,
either in isnad or matn it is clearly marked
as his own" (Traditions of Islam, p. 29).] He did
not accept any hadith unless all the transmitters
were reliable and until there was proof that the later
transmitter had actually met the first; the mere fact that
the two were contemporaries (which is Muslim's test) did not
satisfy him. Thirdly, as regards his fiqaha, or
judgment and acumen, he surpasses all. Fourthly, he heads
the more important of his chapters with a text from the Holy
Quran, and thus shows that Hadith is only an
explanation of the Quran, and as such a secondary source of
the teachings of Islam.
Chapter 2:
Criticism of Hadith:
Method of Counting
different Reports:
Before entering in a
discussion on the criticism of Hadith, I wish to
remove two misconceptions generally prevailing in the West.
The first of these relates to the method of counting
Hadith. A misconception on this point has generally
led the European critics to think that when the great
collectors of Hadith, Bukhari and those whose who
followed him, set to work, there was a vast mass of spurious
hadith, and the collectors did not credit more than
one or two per cent, of the prevailing mass as genuine, and
that these too were taken to be genuine on the slender
authority of the reliability of transmitters without any
regard to the subject matter of the hadith. The
impression that the vast mass of reports taught at the
different centres in the third century was fabricated is
based on a misconception. It is true that it is related of
Bukhari that he took cognisance of 600,000 reports and knew
some 200,000 of these by heart. It is also true that his
Sahih contains no more than 9,000 Hadith. But it
is not true that he found the other 591,000 reports to be
false or fabricated.
[Writing of Bukhari, Guillaume
says: "Tradition reports that this remarkable man took
cognisance of 600,000 hadith, and himself memorised
more than 200,000. Of these he has preserved to us 7,397 or,
according to other authorities, 7,295, if one adds to these
the fragmentary traditions embodied in the tarjamah, the
total is 9,082. When one reflects from these figures
furnished by a Muslim historian that hardly more than one
per cent of the Hadith said to be openly circulating
with the authority of the Prophet behind them were accounted
genuine by the pious Bukhari, one's confidence in the
authenticity of the residue is sorely tried. Where such an
enormous preponderance of material is judged false, nothing
but the successful application of modern canons of evidence
can restore faith in the credibility of the remainder"
(Traditions of Islam, pp. 28, 29). And Muir says: "It
is proved by the testimony of the collectors themselves,
that thousands and tens of thousands of traditions were
current in their times which possessed not even the shadow
of authority. … Bukhari came to the conclusion after
many years, sifting that out of 600,000 traditions
ascertained by him to be then current, only 4,000 were
authentic" (Intr. to Life of Mahomat p.
xxxvii).]
It must be clearly understood that
those who were engaged in the dissemination and study of
Hadith looked upon every report as a different
hadith when even a single transmitter of the
hadith was changed. Let us, for instance, take a
hadith for which the original authority is Abu
Hurairah. Now, Abu Hurairah had 800 disciples in
hadith, and the same hadith may have been
reported by ten of his disciples with or without any
variation. Each of these reports would according to the
collectors of hadith form a separate hadith.
Again, suppose each of the transmitters of Abu Hurairah's
hadith had two reporters, and the same hadith
will count, say, twenty different reports, and the number
would thus go on increasing as the number of reporters
increased. Now at the time when Bukhari applied himself to
Hadith in the first decade of the third century of
Hijrah, there were schools of Hadith at
different centres, and hundreds of students learned
hadith at these schools and reported them to others.
In a chain of ordinarily four or five transmitters, consider
the number of reports that would arise from the same
hadith on account of the variation of transmitters,
and it is easy to understand that 600,000 hadith did
not mean so many reports relating to various subjects but so
many reports coming through different transmitters, many of
them referring to the same incident or conveying the same
subject matter with or without variation of words. That this
was the method of Bukhari's counting of reports is clear
from his book, the Sahih Buhhari, which with the
change of even one transmitter in a chain of say four or
five transmitters, considers the report to be distinct.
["On the other hand, some tradition is often repeated
more than once under different chapters (abwab)
so that if repetitions are disregarded, the number of
distinct Hadith is reduced to 3763" (Traditions of
Islam, p. 28).] What is called repetition in
Bukhari is due to this circumstance.
Reports in
Biographies and Commentaries:
The other misconception is
however of a much graver nature. European criticism of
Hadith has often mixed up hadith with the
reports met with in the biographies of the Holy Prophet and
the commentaries of the Holy Quran. No Muslim scholar has
ever attached the same value to the biographical reports as
hadith narrated in the collections above referred to.
On the other hand, it is recognised by all Muslim critics
that the biographers never made much effort to sift truth
from error. Imam Ahmad ibn Hanbal sums up the Muslim point
of view relating to the trustworthiness of the biographical
reports, when he says that the biographies "are not based on
any principle," and Hafiz Zain-ul-Din 'Iraqi says that "they
contain what is true and what is false." In fact, much of
the adverse European criticism of Hadith would have
been more suitably levelled at the biographical reports. The
same is the case with the reports met with in the
commentaries of the Holy Quran which are still more
unreliable. In fact, many careless commentators mixed up
Hadith with Jewish and Christian stories, and made
free use of the latter as if these were so many reports. As
Ibn Khaldun, speaking of the reports in the commentaries,
says:
"Their books and their
reports contain what is bad and what is good and what may
be accepted and what should be rejected, and the reason
of this is that the Arabs were an ignorant race without
literature and without knowledge, and desert life and
ignorance were their chief characteristics, and whenever
they desired, as mortals do desire, to obtain knowledge
of the cause of existence and the origin of creation and
the mysteries of the universe, they turned for
information to the followers of the Book, the Jews and
such of the Christians as followed their faith. But these
people of the Book were like themselves and their
knowledge of these things went no further than the
knowledge of the ignorant masses. ... So when these
people embraced Islam, they retained their stories which
had no connection with the commandments of the Islamic
law, such as the stories of the origin of creation, and
things relating to the future and the wars etc. These
people were like Kab Ahbar, and Wahb ibn Munabba and
Abdullah ibn Salam and others.
Commentaries of the Holy Quran were
soon filled with these stories of theirs. And in such
like matters, the reports do not go beyond them, and as
these do not deal with commandments, so their correctness
is not sought after to the extent of acting upon them,
and the commentators take them rather carelessly, and
they have thus filled up their commentaries with them"
(Ibn Khaldun, Muqaddama, Vol. I, ch.
'Ulum-ul-Quran).
Shah Waliullah writes in a similar
strain:
"And it is necessary to know
that most of the Israelite stories that have found their
way into the commentaries and histories are copied from
the stories of the Jews and the Christians, and no
commandment or belief can be based upon them"
(Hujjatullah, Ch. I'tisam bil
Kitab).
In fact, in some of the commentaries
the reports cited are puerile nonsense. Even the commentary
of Ibn Jarir (the famous historian, Tabri), with all its
value as a literary production, cannot be relied upon as to
its reports. Ibn Kathir's commentary is, however, an
exception as it contains chiefly the hadith taken
from the reliable collections of Hadith.
Storytellers:
Another thing to be guarded
against in a discussion on Hadith is the mixing up of
Hadith with stories related by storytellers. As in
every other nation, there had grown up among the Muslims a
class of fable-mongers whose business it was to tickle the
fancies of the masses by false stories. These stories were
either taken from Jews, Christians and Persians, with whom
the Muslims came in contact, or they were simply concocted.
The professional storytellers were called the qussas
(pl. of qass, and derived from qassa,
meaning he related a story), and they seem to
have grown up early, for as Razi says, the Caliph 'Ali
ordered that whoever related the story of David as the
storytellers (qassas) relate it, (the
reference being to the story taken from the Bible as to
David having committed adultery with Uria's wife), should be
given 160 stripes, being double the punishment of the
ordinary calumniator. It shows that the storyteller had
begun his work at that early date. But it must be clearly
borne in mind that the storyteller was never mistaken for
the reporters of Hadith, even by the ignorant masses.
His vocation, low as it was, was quite distinct. Hadith
was regularly taught in schools in the different
centres, as I have already shown. The teachers of
Hadith were in the first instance the well-known
companions of the Holy Prophet such as Abu Hurairah, Ibn
'Umar, 'A'ishah, etc., and their place was later on taken by
equally well-known masters of Hadith from among the
tabi'in, that is, the successors of the
companions. The storyteller, whose vocation was limited to
some street corner where he could attract the attention of
passers-by, and perhaps gather round him some lazy
loiterers, could not aspire even to approach a school of
Hadith. As a writer quoted by Guillaume on p. 82 of
his book, says: "They collect a great crowd of people round
them. One qass stations himself at one end of the
street and narrates traditions about the merits of 'Ali,
while his fellow stands at the other end of the street
exalting the virtues of Abu Bakr. Thus they secure the pence
of the Nasibi as well as the Shi'i and divide their gains
equally afterwards." Could such beggars and braggarts be
mistaken for reporters of a Hadith by any sensible
person? Yet even scholars like Sir William Muir and other
famous Orientalists often try to mix up the two, and they
speak of these stories as being mixed up with Hadith.
It is true that these stories have found a place in some
commentaries, the authors of which had a love for the
curious and never gave much attention to sift truth from
error, but the muhaddithin, that is, the
collectors of Hadith, would never accept a story from
this source. They knew the storytellers and their
absurdities well enough. The collectors were so careful that
they would not accept a report if one of the reporters was
known to have told a lie or fabricated a single report
[In the Sharh Nukhbat-ul-fikr, Ibn Hajar, while
speaking of ta'n (i.e. accusation against a
transmitter) says that if a transmitter is shown to have
told a lie in remitting a hadith or even if he is
accused of having told a lie, he is discredited (p.
66).], as every European critic of Hadith must
admit; how could such people accept the puerile stories of
the street storyteller who was known to be following this
vocation for collecting a few coins. That there are some
incredible stories in even the collections of Hadith
is true, but they are so rare that not the least
discredit can be thrown on these collections on that
account, and the causes which were at work to bring this
about were quite different.
European Criticism
of Hadith:
Among all European critics,
the prevailing idea is that the Muslim critics of
Hadith have never gone beyond the transmission line,
and that the subject-matter of hadith has been left
quite untouched. There are also suggestions that even the
companions of the Holy Prophet were so unscrupulous that
they fabricated hadith, while the strictest Muslim
critics of the transmitters are agreed that when a
hadith is traced back to a companion of the Holy
Prophet, its authenticity is beyond all question. In the
chapter on criticism of Hadith by Muslims, Guillaume
makes the suggestion that Abu Hurairah was in the habit of
fabricating hadith. Thus he says:
"A most significant
recognition within Hadith itself of the
untrustworthiness of guarantors is to be found in
Bukhari. Ibn 'Umar reports that Muhammad ordered
all dogs to be killed save sheepdogs. Abu Hurairah added
the word au Zar'in whereupon Ibn 'Umar makes the
remark, 'Abu Hurairah owned cultivated land.' A better
illustration of the underlying motive of some hadith
can hardly be found" (p.78).
The conclusion is preposterous. In the
first place, Abu Hurairah is not alone in reporting that
dogs may be kept for hunting as well as keeping watch over
sheep or tillage. Bukhari reports a hadith, (No.
1127), in the Kitab ul-wakala (ch. 41) from Sufyan
ibn Abi Zubair in the following words: "I heard the
Messenger of God, may peace and the blessings of God be upon
him, saying, Whoever keeps a dog which does not serve him in
keeping watch over cultivated land or goats, one qirat
of his reward is diminished every day. The man who
reported from him said, Hast thou heard this from the
Messenger of God? He said, Yes, by the Lord of this Mosque."
Now this report clearly mentions watchdogs kept for sheep as
well as those kept for tillage, while there is no mention in
it of dogs kept for hunting which the Holy Quran allows in
plain words (5:4). Abu Hurairah's report in the same chapter
preceding the one cited above expressly mentions all these
kinds: watchdogs for sheep or tillage and dogs for hunting.
It only shows that Abu Hurairah had a more retentive memory.
And as regards Ibn 'Umar's remark, there is not the least
evidence that there was any insinuation in it as to Abu
Hurairah's integrity. It may be simply an explanatory remark
or the suggestion may be simply this that Abu Hurairah
preserved that part of the saying because he had to keep
watchdogs for his cultivated land. With all the mistakes
that Abu Hurairah may have made in reporting so many
hadith and he had an exceptionally retentive memory,
no critic has ever questioned his integrity. In fact, the
critics of Hadith are unanimous that no companion of
the Holy Prophet ever told a lie. Thus Ibn Hajar says in the
introduction to his Isaba: "The Ahl Sunnah are
unanimous that all (the companions) are 'adul, that
is, truthful." The word 'adala as used
regarding transmitters of reports means that there has been
no intentional deviation from truthfulness. This is not
simply due to the respect in which the companions of the
Holy Prophet are held, for the critics of the transmitters
of Hadith never spared any one simply because he had
a place of honour in their hearts. Further on, in the same
chapter, Guillaume asserts that independent thinkers in the
second and third century not only questioned the authority
of Hadith altogether but that they derided the very
system.
Here are his words:
"However, there was still a
large circle outside the orthodox thinkers who rejected
the whole system of Hadith. They were not
concerned to adopt those which happened to fit in with
the views and doctrines of the doctors, or even with
those which might fairly be held to support their own
view of life. So far from being impressed by the
earnestness of the traditionists who scrupulously
examined the isnad or by the halo of sanctity
which had gathered round the early guarantors of
tradition, the independent thinkers of the second and
third centuries openly mocked and derided the system as a
whole and the persons and matters named therein."
And what is the evidence for these
sweeping statements? It is added:
"Some of the most flagrant
examples of these lampoons will be found in the Book
of Songs, where indecent stories are cast into the
form in which tradition was customarily handed down to
posterity."
Thus the independent thinkers of
Guillaume who rejected the system of Hadith and
openly mocked and derided the system as a whole are the
lampooners mentioned in the concluding portion of the
paragraph! It is rather strange that such a learned scholar
should make such irresponsible remarks. The Aghani,
the Book of Songs to which he refers, as if it were a
collection of lampoons directed against Hadith, is an
important collection of songs by the famous Arabian
historian, Abul-Faraj 'Ali-ibn-Husain, commonly known as
Isbahani (born in 284 a.h.). I am at a loss to understand
why the learned author of The Traditions of Islam
should look upon it as an attempt to mock and deride the
system of Hadith. [The
Encyclopaedia of Islam speaks of Aghani in the
following words: "His chief work, which alone has been
preserved, is the great Kitab-ul-Aghani; in this he
collected the songs which were popular in his time, adding
the accounts of their authors and their origin which
appeared of interest to him ... with every song there is
indicated, besides the text, the air according to the
musical terminology ... to these are added very detailed
accounts concerning the poet, often also concerning
composers and singers, of both sexes. In spite of its
unsystematic order this book is our most important authority
not only for literary history till into the third century
of Hijrah but also for the history of civilisation"
(Art. Abul Faradj).] There may be some indecent
stories connected with these songs but the presence of such
stories does not alter the nature of the work which is an
historical collection, as indecent stories are met even in
the books of the Bible. There is not a word, either in the
book itself or in any earlier writing, to show that the
collection was made in a spirit of lampoonery. And to draw
such a conclusion simply from the fact that along with the
songs collected are given the names of those through whom
the songs were remitted is to show an entire ignorance of
history. It was the common method adopted in all historical
writings and collections of the time, as anyone can easily
see by referring to the historical writings of Sa'd or
Tabri. The object was not to insult the method of
transmission of Hadith; it was simply adopted on
account of its historical value.
Guillaume has also mentioned the names
of two great Muslim thinkers, Ibn Qutaiba and Ibn Khaldun,
in this connection, but these great thinkers neither
rejected the Hadith system as a whole, nor ever
mocked or derided that system and the persons and matters
mentioned therein. What these great thinkers have said about
Hadith is accepted by every serious Muslim thinker.
Ibn Qutaiba, rather defended the Quran and Hadith
against scepticism, and Guillaume has himself quoted Dr.
Nicholson's remarks with approval that "every impartial
student will admit the justice of Ibn Qutaiba's claim that
no religion has such historical attestation as Islam …
Laisa li ummat-in min al-umami asnadun ka-asnadihim."
Now the Arabic word asnad used in the original, and
translated as historical attestations, is the plural of
sanad which means an authority, and refers especially
to the reporters on whose authority Hadith is
accepted. Thus Ibn Qutaiba claims for Hadith a higher
authority than any other history of the time, and the claim
is admitted by both Nicholson and Guillaume. In The
Encyclopaedia of Islam it is plainly stated that Ibn
Qutaiba "defended the Quran and Tradition against the
attacks of philosophic scepticism." Ibn Khaldun also never
attacked Hadith itself, and it has already been shown
that his remarks apply only to stories which have generally
been rejected by the collectors of Hadith.
Canons of Criticism
of Hadith as accepted by
Muslims:
There is no doubt that the
collectors of Hadith laid special stress on the
trustworthiness of the narrators. As Guillaume says:
"Inquiries were made as to the character of the guarantors
whether they were tainted with heretical doctrines, whether
they had a reputation for truthfulness, and had the ability
to transmit what they themselves heard. Finally it was
necessary that they should be competent witnesses whose
testimony would be accepted in a court of civil law." More
than this, they tried their best to find out that the report
was traceable to the Holy Prophet through the various
stages. Even the companions of the Holy Prophet did not
accept every hadith which was brought to their notice
until they were fully satisfied that it came from the Holy
Prophet. But the Muhaddithin went beyond the
narrators, and they had rules of criticism which were
applied to the subject matter of Hadith. In judging
whether a certain hadith was fabricated or genuine,
the collectors of Hadith not only made a thorough
inquiry regarding the trustworthiness of the transmitters
but also applied other rules of criticism which are in no
way inferior to modern methods of criticism. Shah 'Abdul
'Aziz has summarised these rules in the 'Ujala
Nafi'ah, and according to these a report was not
accepted under any of the following
circumstances:
01. If it was opposed to
recognised historical facts.
02. If the reporter was a Shi'a and
the hadith was of the nature of an accusation
against the companions of the Holy Prophet, or the
reporter was a Kharijite and the hadith was of the
nature of an accusation against a member of the Prophet's
family. If, however, such a report was corroborated by
independent testimony, it was accepted.
03. If it was of such a nature that
to know it and act upon it was incumbent upon all, and it
was reported by a single man.
04. If the time and the
circumstances of its narration contained evidence of its
forgery. [An example of this is met with in the
following incident related in Hayat ul-Hayawan.
Harun al-Rashid loved pigeons. A pigeon was sent to
him as a present. Qazi Abul Bakhtari was sitting by him
at the time, and to please the monarch he narrated a
hadith to the effect that there should be no
betting except in racing or archery or flying of birds.
Now the concluding words were a forgery, and the Caliph
knew this. So when the Qazi was gone, he ordered the
pigeon to be slaughtered, adding that the fabrication of
this portion of the hadith was due to the pigeon.
The collectors of Hadith on that account did not
accept any hadith of Abul
Bakhtari.]
05. If it was against reason
[Ibn 'Abdul Barr (d. 463) and Al-Nawavi (d.
476) do not hesitate to assail traditions which seem to
them to be contrary to reason or derogatory to the
dignity of the Prophet" (Traditions of Islam by
Guillaume, p. 94.)] or against the plain teachings of
Islam. [Examples of this are the hadith
relating to Qadza 'Umri, that is, going
through the performance of the rak'ats of daily
prayers on the last Friday in the month of Ramadan as an
atonement for not saying prayers regularly, or the
hadith, which says, Do not eat melon until you
slaughter it.]
06. If it mentioned an incident,
which, if it had happened, would have been known to and
reported by large numbers, while that incident was not
reported by any one except the particular
reporter.
07. If its subject-matter or words
were rakik (i.e. unsound or incorrect); for
instance, the words were not in accordance with Arabic
idiom or the subject matter was unbecoming the Prophet's
dignity.
08. If it contained threatenings of
heavy punishment for ordinary sins or promises of mighty
reward for slight good deeds.
09. If it spoke of the reward of
prophets and messengers to the doers of good.
10. If the narrator confessed that
he fabricated the report.
Similar rules of criticism are laid
down by Mulla 'Ali Qari in his work entitled Maudzu'at
and by Ibn-ul-Jauzi, for which see the
Fath-ul-Mughith and by Ibn Hajar for which see
Nazhatul Nazar.
The Quran as the
Great Test for Judging Hadith:
In addition to these rules of
criticism, which I think leave little to be desired, there
is another very important test of judging the
trustworthiness of Hadith, and it is a test whose
application was commanded by the Holy Prophet himself.
"There will be narrators," he is reported to have said,
"reporting Hadith from me, so judge by the Quran; if
a report agrees with the Quran accept it; otherwise, reject
it" (Ibn 'Asakir). "The genuineness of this hadith is
beyond all question as it stands on the soundest basis.
[A hadith, however sound the statement it
contains and however great the authority on which it is
based, is readily condemned as a fabrication by European
critics when it does not suit their canons of criticism.
Thus Guillaume, after quoting the well-known hadith,
which is reported by a very large number of
companions—so large that not the least doubt can be
entertained as to its genuineness: "Whoever shall repeat
from me that which I have not said, his resting place shall
be in hell," remarks: "A study of the theological systems of
the world would hardly reveal a more naive attempt to tread
the Sirat-ul-Mustaqim" (p. 79). Referring to the same
hadith, the same author remarks: "In order to combat
false traditions, they invented others equally destitute of
prophetic authority" (p. 78) Such irresponsible remarks ill
befit a book of criticism. The genuineness of this hadith
is beyond all doubt, and it has been accepted as such by
collectors of reports. It cannot be denied that there are
theological systems whose very basic principles are the
concoctions of pious men, but in Islam the very details are
matters of history and "pious lies" could not find here any
ground to prosper.] That Hadith was in vogue in
the time of the Holy Prophet is a fact admitted by even
European critics, as I have already shown, and that the
authority of the Quran was higher than that of Hadith
appears from numerous circumstances. "I am no more than
a man" the Prophet is reported to have said according to a
very reliable hadith, "when I order you anything
respecting religion receive it, and when I order anything
about the affairs of the world, I am no more than a man"
(Bkh. Msh. 1:6). There is another saying of his: "My sayings
do not abrogate the word of God, but the word of God can
abrogate my sayings" (Msh. I: 6). The hadith relating
to Mu'adh, which has been quoted elsewhere, places the Holy
Quran first, and after that Hadith. [On being
appointed Governor of Yemen, Mu'adh was asked by the Holy
Prophet as to the rule by which he would abide. "By the law
of the Quran," he replied. "But if you do not find any
direction therein?" asked the Prophet. "Then I will act
according to the Sunnah of the Prophet," was the
reply. And the Holy Prophet approved of it.]
'A'ishah used to repeat a verse of the
Holy Quran on hearing words from the mouth of the Holy
Prophet when she thought that the purport of what the
Prophet said did not agree with the Holy Quran. The great
Imam Bukhari quotes a verse of the Holy Quran whenever he
finds one suiting his text, before citing a hadith,
thus showing that the Quran holds precedence over
Hadith. And by the agreement of the Muslim community,
Bukhari which is considered to be the most reliable
of all collections of Hadith, is looked upon only as
asahh-ul-Kutub ba'da Kitab illah or the most reliable
of books after the Book of God. This verdict of the
community as a whole shows clearly that even if Bukhari
disagrees with the Quran, it is Bukhari that must
be rejected and not the Book of God. And as has already been
stated at the commencement of this chapter, Hadith is
only an explanation of the Quran, and hence also the Quran
must have precedence over the Hadith. And last of
all, both the Muslim and the non-Muslim historians are
agreed that the Holy Quran has been handed down intact,
every word and every letter of it, while Hadith
cannot claim that purity, as it was chiefly the purport
that was reported. All these considerations show that the
saying that Hadith must be judged by the Quran is
quite in accordance with the teachings of the Holy Prophet,
and there is not the least ground for doubting its
genuineness. And even if there were no such hadith,
the test suggested in it would still have been the right
test because the Holy Quran deals with the principles of the
Islamic law while Hadith deals with its details, and
it is just and reasonable that only such details should be
accepted as are in consonance with the principles. And as
the Prophet is plainly represented m the Holy Quran as not
following "aught save that which was revealed" to him (6:50;
7: 203; 46: 9), and as not disobeying a word of that which
was revealed to him (6: 15; 13: 15), it follows clearly that
if there is anything in Hadith which is not in
consonance with the Holy Quran, it could not have proceeded
from the Prophet, and hence must be rejected.
How far did the
Muhaddathin apply these Tests?
Now the question is, did all
the collectors of Hadith pay equal regard to the
above cannons of criticism? That it could not be so is clear
enough. The earliest of them, Bukhari is by a happy
coincidence also the soundest of them. He was not only most
careful in accepting the trustworthiness of the narrators of
Hadith, but he also paid the utmost attention to the
last of the critical tests enumerated above, viz, the
test of judging Hadith by the Quran. Many of his
books and chapters are headed by Quranic verses, and
occasionally he was contented himself with a verse of the
Quran in support of his text. This shows that his criticism
of Hadith was not limited to a mere examination of
the guarantors as every European critic thinks, but that he
also applied other tests. The process of criticism was, of
course, applied mentally and one should not expect a record
of that criticism in the book itself. Similar was the case
with the other collectors of Hadith. They followed
the necessary rules of criticism but they were not all
equally careful, nor did they all possess equal acumen. They
indeed sometimes intentionally relaxed the rules of
criticism whether in relation to the examination of the
narrators or the critical tests. They also made a difference
between hadith relating to matters of jurisprudence
and other hadith, such as those that related to past
history or to prophecies about the future or to other
material which had nothing to do with the practical life of
a man. We are clearly told that they were stricter in
matters of jurisprudence than in other hadith. Thus
Baihaqi says in the Kitab-ul Madkhal: "When we
narrate from the Holy Prophet in what is allowed and what is
prohibited, we are strict in the chain of transmission and
in the criticism of the narrators but when we relate reports
about the merits of people and about reward and punishment
we are lax in the line of transmission and overlook the
defects of the narrators." And Ahmad ibn Hanbal says: "Ibn
Ishaq is a man from whom such reports may be taken, that
is, those which relate to Sira or life of the
Prophet, but when the question is what is allowed and what
is forbidden, we have recourse to a (strong) people like
this, and he inserted the fingers of one hand amid those of
the other," conjoining the hands and thus pointing to the
strength of character of the transmitters. It must, however,
be admitted that most of the collectors of Hadith
paid more attention to examination of narrators than to the
other critical tests, and I think that they were justified
in this. Their object was to produce reliable collections of
Hadith, and, therefore, their first concern was to
see that the Hadith could be reliably traced back to
the Holy Prophet through a trustworthy chain of narrators.
This part of the criticism was the more essential, as the
longer the chain of narrators became, the more difficult
would it have been to test their reliability. Other tests
could be applied to any hadith at any time, and the
passing of a thousand years could not in any way effect the
value of these tests, but the passing away of another
century would have rendered the task of the examination of
narrators most difficult, if not impossible. Hence the
collectors of Hadith rightly focussed their attention
on this test. Nor did the work of the collection of
Hadith close the door as to further criticism or as
to the application of other rules of criticism. The
Muhaddith contented themselves with producing
collections reliable in the main, and left the rest of the
work of criticism to be done by future generations. They
never claimed faultlessness for their works; even Bukhari
did not do it. They exercised their judgments to the best of
their ability, but they never claimed, nor does any Muslim
claim on their behalf, infallibility of judgment. In fact,
they had started a work which was to continue for generation
after generation of the Muslims. If possible, a hundred more
canons of criticism may be laid down, but still it would be
the judgment of one man as to whether a certain
hadith must be accepted or rejected. Every collection
is the work of one muhaddith, and even if ninety nine
percent of his judgments are correct, there is still room
for the exercise of judgment by others. Where the Western
critic errs is that he thinks that infallibility is claimed
for any of the collections of Hadith and that the
exercise of judgment by a certain muhaddith precludes
the exercise of judgment by others as to the reliability of
a report.
Another point to be borne in mind in
this connection is that, however much the collectors of
Hadith might have differed in their judgments as to
the necessity of rigour in the rules of criticism, they set
to work with minds absolutely free from bias or external
influences. They would lay down their lives rather than
swerve a hair's breadth from what they considered to be the
truth. Many of the famous Imams preferred punishment
or jail to uttering a word against their convictions. The
fact is generally admitted as regards the Umayyad rule. As
Guillaume says: "They laboured to establish the Sunnah
of the community as it was, or as it was thought to have
been, under the Prophet's rule, and so they found their
bitterest enemies in the ruling house" (Traditions of
Islam, p.42). The independence of thought among the
great Muslim divines under the Abbaside rule had not
deteriorated in the least. They would not even accept office
under a Muslim ruler. "It is well-known," says Th. W.
Juyuboll in the Encyclopaedia of Islam, "that
many pious independent men in those days deemed it wrong and
refused to enter the service of the Government or to accept
an office dependent on it" (p. 91).
Different Classes
of Hadith:
Ibn Hajar has dealt with
different classes of hadith in the Sharh Nukhbat
al-Fikr at great length. The most important division of
hadith is into mutawatir (continuous) and
ahad (isolated). A hadith is said to be
mutawatir (lit. repeated successively or by one after
another) when it is reported by such a large number that it
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