What is Hadith(Prophet's Discourse)?
Do they not look in the dominion of the heavens and the earth and all things that Allah has created, and that it may be that the end of their lives is near. In what message(hadith) after this will they then believe.
These are the Ayat (proofs, evidences, verses, lessons, revelations, etc.) of Allah, which We recite to you with truth. Then in which speech(hadith) after Allah and His Ayat will they believe?
Then in what statement(hadith) after this (the Quran) will they believe?
As you can see above English equivalents used for the word "Hadith" in translations include words such as "word, message, statement, discourse, and speech."
The use of the word "hadith" in these verses , and the labeling of fabricated sayings as sources equivalent to the Quran as "hadith," is a miracle of the Quran. The Quran miraculously points to hadiths that expand the single source of religion to hundreds of books.The most misleading aspect of this is that it is attributed to the prophet.
The word 'kavi' is at the forefront of the words used in the Quran to mean 'speech' . 'Kalam' is the second word that can be translated as 'speech' . Let's look at the usage table:
The word 'kavi', along with its derivatives, has been used in over 1700 places. Over 70 of these are direct uses of the word 'kavi' (speech/word). The others are mostly verbs, but also imperatives and nouns.
Similarly, the word 'kelam' (speech/word), along with its derivatives, appears in 73 places. Over 40 of these uses are direct uses of the word 'kelam'. In a few places, the word 'kelime' (word/word), which comes from the same root and has the same meaning, is used.
And again, those who attribute many lies to Prophet could have used words like "agval" (words) , "ahbar" (news) , "hikam" (wisdom), or another Arabic word to describe the Prophet's sayings.
Given that there are so many words used or that could be used to mean "speech/word," why is the word "hadith" specifically used? And why is the comparison with the Quran, and the emphasis on placing the Quran above the hadith, particularly noticeable in the places where the word "hadith" is used?
The fact that scholars of hadith, who contradict each other on every point, unanimously refer to these sayings as "hadith," and that they are specifically mentioned in these verses of the Quran, is one of the countless miracles of the Quran.
In the following verses, the Quran describes itself as "the word that is not a fabricated hadith" :
There is certainly a moral in their accounts for those who possess intellect. This [Quran] is not a fabricated discourse; rather, it is a confirmation of what was [revealed] before it, and an elaboration of all things, and a guidance and mercy for a people who have fait
This Quran could not have been fabricated by anyone besides Allah; rather, it is a confirmation of what was [revealed] before it, and an elaboration of the Book, there is no doubt in it, from the Lord of all the worlds.
Let them bring a discourse like it, if they are truthful.
The expression "Lahw Al-Hadith," which appears only in the following verse in the Quran, encompasses meanings such as "false story, fable," "empty talk," "wordplay," and "verbal trickery." Narratives that distract and hinder a person from learning the truth, such as baseless stories, fables, and legends, fall within the scope of this concept.
And of mankind is he who purchases idle talk (Lahw Al-Hadith) to mislead from the path of Allah without knowledge, and takes it by way of mockery. For such there will be a humiliating torment.
When the Companions approached the Prophet Muhammed and requested, "O Messenger of Allah, tell us something other than the Quran," the 23rd verse of Surah Az-Zumar(39:23) was revealed in response. (Shatibi; Muwafaqat, 1/49) This verse emphasizes that what Allah has revealed, namely the Quran, is the best of all hadiths, and states the following:
Allah has revealed the most beautiful Message(Ahsan Al-Hadith) in the form of a Book, consistent with itself, (yet) repeating (its teaching in various aspects): the skins of those who fear their Lord tremble thereat; then their skins and their hearts do soften to the celebration of Allah's praises. Such is the guidance of Allah: He guides therewith whom He pleases, but such as Allah leaves to stray, can have none to guide.
The two verses below show that the word "hadith" is used to mean the Prophet's own words. As can be understood, it clearly refers to sayings and conversations held within the context of daily life.
And when the Prophet disclosed a matter in confidence to one of his wives (Hafsah), so when she told it (to another i.e. 'Aishah), and Allah made it known to him, he informed part thereof and left a part. Then when he told her (Hafsah) thereof, she said: "Who told you this?" He said: "The All-Knower, the All-Aware (Allah) has told me".
O you who have believed, do not enter the houses of the Prophet except when you are permitted for a meal, without awaiting its readiness. But when you are invited, then enter; and when you have eaten, disperse without seeking to remain for conversation. Indeed, that [behavior] was troubling the Prophet, and he is shy of [dismissing] you. But Allah is not shy of the truth. And when you ask [his wives] for something, ask them from behind a partition. That is purer for your hearts and their hearts. And it is not [conceivable or lawful] for you to harm the Messenger of Allah or to marry his wives after him, ever. Indeed, that would be in the sight of Allah an enormity.
It is generally accepted that the Prophet forbade the writing down of his own words:
“Do not write anything from me except the Quran. Whoever has written anything from me other than the Quran, let him destroy it.” (Muslim, Sahih Muslim, Kitab-i Zuhd; Hanbel, Musnad, 3/12, 21, 33)
The hadith in Darimi is as follows: “The Companions asked the Messenger of Allah for permission to write down his words. However, they were not given permission.” (Darimi, al-Sunan)
The hadith in Al-Khatib is as follows: “While we were writing down hadiths, the Prophet (peace be upon him) came to us and said, ‘What are you writing?’ We said, ‘Hadiths (sayings) that we heard from you.’ The Prophet (peace be upon him) said, ‘Do you want a book other than the Book of Allah? The nations before you went astray because they wrote other books besides the Book of Allah.’” (Al-Khatib, Takyid)
We can also learn this from Tirmidhi: “We asked the Messenger of Allah for permission to write down his words, but he did not give us permission.” (Tirmidhi, al-Sunan, Kitab al-Ilm)
How could Prophet Muhammed forbid the writing down of hadiths, risking people learning about religion incompletely, having lies added to his words, and some of his sayings being forgotten?
The Quran emphasizes writing with a pen; it mentions writing down wills and debts. Given the importance attributed to writing in the Quran, and if the hadith books are the primary source of our religion, how could it be that writing was not permitted?
If the Prophet prevented a source of the religion from being recorded, wouldn't he also have prevented the religion from being learned completely and accurately?
However, Quranic verses state that the Quran is the sufficient and only valid source for religious matters. Undoubtedly, the Prophet Muhammad understood this best. As can be seen, the Prophet's Sunnah (way of life) is not about writing down hadiths as books that add to the Quran, but about not writing them down at all.
Interestingly, if we were to examine the hadiths in an explanatory way, we would see that their numbers take on a pyramid shape according to the years. The apex of the pyramid, the smallest area, is the period of the Messenger of Allah, and as we descend, the width of the pyramid increases. When we reach the base of the pyramid, we realize how much wider it is than the Prophet's time. However, the opposite would be logical. Because those who were with the Prophet were the ones who knew the hadiths the most. Then, with their deaths, the number of those who knew the hadiths would decrease, and in this way, the pyramid at the top would develop in the opposite direction. But we see that the hadiths from the Umayyad period are more numerous than those from Prophet's period.”
Muslim states that he did not include every hadith that he considered authentic, that is, definitively true, in his book (Muslim, Volume 1). According to Muslim's logic, hadiths are a source of religion, but he did not include every hadith he considered true in his book. Therefore, according to this logic, religion of Islam is incomplete. Since there is no guarantee that someone else did not omit a hadith that Muslim omitted, the traditional Sunni approach carries this explanation, which declares itself incomplete, in its sources.
Bukhari, who says that hadiths are a source of religion, knew 600,000 hadiths and included only 6,000-7,000 of them, or 1%, in his book. He did not include the remaining 99% because he concluded that we did not need them or that they were unreliable. Indeed, Bukhari states in his book that the number of authentic hadiths he did not include, simply to keep the book from getting too long, is much greater than the number he did include. If hadiths were a source of religion; We would have been entirely at the mercy and discretion of Buhari.
Let's imagine that Bukhari did nothing in his life, never slept, and dedicated two hours to verifying the authenticity of each hadith—that is, the soundness of its chain of transmission. This alone would take him more than 130 years. However, if we consider the claim that sometimes he traveled for days just to verify the soundness of a single link in the chain of a hadith, then testing the authenticity of all the hadiths he knew would take thousands of years.
In well-known hadith books, it is stated that under the heading of "jarh wa ta'dil" (criticism and authentication), the truthfulness, memory, and belief of those who narrated hadith were questioned. However, until the 3rd century After Hegira(Prophet's migration from Mecca to Medina.), it would take more than a lifetime to thoroughly examine the honesty, memory, and other qualities of all the thousands of intermediaries in narrations made with phrases like "I heard from so-and-so, so-and-so heard from so-and-so, so-and-so heard from so-and-so. " Abu Shama says on this matter: " Opinions about those who narrated hadith have become so varied that a single narrator could be considered the leader of the believers by some, and the most dishonest of people by others." For example , while Ikrimah was considered a highly respected narrator by Bukhari and many other famous hadith scholars, he was considered a liar by Muslim. There are many examples of this. However, in our opinion, the most interesting example is that of Bukhari, the author of the most famous hadith book according to traditional understanding, who declared Abu Hanifa, the head of the most widespread school of thought, as "ghayri-sika," meaning "untrustworthy," and did not quote a single hadith from him. According to the most famous hadith scholar, the founder of the most famous school of thought is untrustworthy, but according to the traditional, imitative mentality, these two are "the most trustworthy, the most blessed." In the discussions about the reliability of those who narrate hadiths, contradictory explanations are at least as numerous as the contradictions in the hadiths themselves.
After the death of the Prophet, the four caliphs—Abu Bakr, Umar, Uthman, and Ali—died no hadith compilation. After this period fearing the death of the scholars, the Umayyad Caliph Umar ibn Abd al-Aziz (died 720) ordered the research and compilation of hadith, and the Umayyad Caliph Hisham (died 743) is considered the first to collect hadith. Imam Malik's hadith collection, Muwatta (776), is followed by Ibn Hanbal's Musnad (843), the founder of the Hanbali school of thought. The authors of the six famous hadith books—the Kutub al-Sitta—died in the following years: Bukhari (870), Muslim (875), Tirmidhi (892), Abu Dawud (889), Nasai (915), and Ibn Majah (886) . As can be seen, when the hadith books began to be written, neither a Companion nor anyone who had seen a Companion (Tabi'un) was alive. Six or seven generations passed between the death of the Prophet and the writing of the hadith books, and the famous hadith books that narrated these hadiths transmitted them through chains of transmission allegedly passed between six or seven people. This method began systematically with Bukhari. Considering that Bukhari lived in the 200s AH, the fact that the chains of transmission of hadiths were memorized according to a method that did not exist before Bukhari makes the claim that this criterion, which would be established later, was considered from the beginning, not at all convincing. Let's see two examples:
Prophet Mohammed
Omar ibn al-Khattab
Ibn Waqqas
Ibn Ibrahim al-Taimi
Yahya ibn Said al-Ansari
Sufyan
Abdullah ibn Zubayr
Bukhari
Prophet Mohammed
Aişa
Urwan ibn Zubayr
Ibn Shi'ab
Ukai
El Baith
Yahya ibn Bukheir
Bukhari
As seen in the two hadith chain examples above, when those hadiths were narrated, even the person after the next link in the chain after the Prophet had passed away. In other words, the individuals whose truthfulness the hadith scholars would verify were dead. Therefore, even if you mistakenly accept all the Companions as truthful, it is impossible to verify the truthfulness of a significant portion of the generations after the Companions, since they had also passed away by the time the hadith books were written. Therefore, the endeavor that hadith writers call "the science of criticism and authentication" is entirely fruitless, as it cannot be applied to those who are dead. Nowhere in the Quran is there any statement suggesting that everyone who saw the Prophet should be trusted.
Aside from the fact that truth and falsehood may be mixed within the hadiths, even hadith scholars do not claim that the hadiths were transmitted to us exactly as they were spoken by the Prophet. Many hadith scholars, most notably Bukhari, stated that preserving the meaning of the hadith was sufficient and that memorizing the original text was not necessary. This led to many people inserting their own opinions into the hadiths, and those who did not fully understand them distorting the text and thus the meaning. Since not every narrator possessed a memory strong enough to retain the text of the hadith, they transmitted the hadiths as they remembered them, which caused shifts in meaning from one narrator to another. Despite all these drawbacks, Bukhari and the heads of the two largest Sunni schools of thought, the Hanafi and Shafi'i schools, Abu Hanifa and Shafi'i, considered the transmission of the meaning sufficient.
Upon hearing that Abu Hurayra attributed a hadith to the Prophet saying, "Bad luck comes from three things: a house, a woman, and a horse," Aisha said, "I swear by Allah that the Messenger of Allah never said that. He only said: ' The people of the Age of Ignorance used to say: Bad luck comes from three things: a house, a woman, and a horse.'" As can be seen, this objection to Abu Hurayra (what the people of the Age of Ignorance said and claiming the Prophet said it) is an example of the disasters caused by narrating hadiths without mentioning the beginning, end, context, and conditions, claiming that "hadith transmission is possible only by meaning."