Can all hadiths be considered equal? How is reading a hadith on social media comparable to hearing words directly from the mouth of the Prophet (saw)? How do we know a hadith is true? Who decides what is an authentic hadith? Isn’t it time for preachers and clerics in Mauritius to start educating the public about the hadith corpus and how a Muslim ought to engage with it when they encounter a hadith in their daily life?
Mohammad Hashim Kamali writes in his book Principles of Islamic Jurisprudence[i]:
“The words of the Prophet are hujjah (binding proof) on anyone who heard the Prophet saying them. As for us and the generation of Muslims who received them though the verbal and written reports of narrators, we need to ascertain their authenticity.”
From this we can see that just because a statement is attributed to the Prophet (saw), this is not enough for us to believe that it is actually true. According to most scholars of legal theory (usūl al fiqh) the hadiths transmitted to us are of two types: the mutawātir (massively transmitted reports) and the āhād (solitary reports).[ii]
The mutawātir as our shaykh, Hassan as Saqqaf explained in his book al ‘aqīdah wa al tawhīd is[iii]:
سنة متواترة متوارثة مقطوع بها عند جميع فرق المسلمين، كعدد الصلوات و أنها خمس و عدد ركعات كل صلاة و أنّ في كل ركعة سجدتين و ركوعا واحدا، و ما هو متفق عليه عند المسلمين من صفات الصوم و الزكاة و الحج و الحلال و الحرام الذي لم يختلفوا فيه
“The Sunna (hadiths) which is widely known and firmly established among all the sects of Islam (sunni ash’ari, sunni maturidi, sunni athari, twelver shia, zaydi shia, ismaili shia, mu’tazila and ibadi). This include for example that the number of salah is five, that each salah has two sajdah and one ruku’, and the agreed upon (by Muslims of all sects) ritual practices in the way of fasting, giving zakah and performing hajj and those things that are halal and haram (that are again agreed upon and derived from the hadiths).”
The āhād hadiths are those that did not fulfil the requirement of the mutawātir. Most hadiths that are recorded in the books of hadiths are āhād. All sects of Islam have their own way of verifying what hadiths from the āhād category are authentic. So, it would not be right to say about a scholar who deemed some hadiths āhād as weak or false, that he or she is a rejector of the Sunna.
I have included some videos which I hope will help the common Muslims understand how the hadith science works.
This is a series by Dr Shabir Ally entitled “Can We Trust Hadith?”.
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLFgZuRzI2wM7lUU7yIyD7p6uPHt_KUYzz
This is a series entitled “How to differentiate between authentic and fabricated hadith” in three parts with these scholars explaining the concept: Sheikh Asrar Rashid, Sheikh Hamza Yusuf, Dr Shehzad Saleem, Mufti Abu Layth, Sheikh Imran Nazar Hossein and Dr Shabir Ally.
This series in two parts is entitled “Inkar-e-Hadith aur Javed Ghamidi” and is in Urdu.
[i] Principles of Islamic Jurisprudence, Mohammad Hashim Kamali, pg 48,49
[ii] Imam Shafi’i makes the distinction between mutawātir and āhād in his book al risālah:
Yes, I answered. When one rules on the basis of the Book and widely agreed-upon instances of Prophetic Practice, concerning which there is no dispute (mutawātir), in such a case we say: we have ruled correctly both according to the apparent meaning and the true meaning. When one rules on the basis of an account of a Prophetic practice that has been narrated as an isolated transmission, and upon which people have not agreed (āhād), we say: we have ruled correctly, but on the basis of the apparent meaning, since it is possible for the person who related such a hadith-report to have been mistaken. (The Epistle on Legal Theory: A Translation of Al-Shafii’s Risalah, Joseph E. Lowry pg 255)
قلت: نعم يحكم بالكتاب والسنة المجتمع عليها الذي لا اختلاف فيها فنقول لهذا حكمنا بالحق في الظاهر والباطن، ويحكم بالسنة قد رويت من طريق الانفراد لا يجتمع الناس عليها فنقول حكمنا بالحق في الظاهر لأنه قد يمكن الغلط فيمن روى الحديث (ص. ٥٩٩)
[iii] Matn al ‘aqīdah wa al tawhīd, Hassan bin Ali as Saqqaf, pg 5
