a short history of the hadith

8/10/2019 A short history of the Hadith

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Quranism, and a History of the Hadith

Hadith(plural ahadith), meaning speech or report, is the Arabic word used by Muslims to

refer to a prophetic tradition. These traditions were collected around 230 AH, and have been an

important, but sometimes controversial, source of Muslim practice and legal theory ever since.

There have always been, however, Muslims who reject the Hadith as spiritually authoritative on

one grounds or another. Even the most well respected collections, called sahih or authentic,

contain things that are embarrassing or even offensive to the sensibilities of a well-educated

person. In addition to this, many people who reject Hadith do so on the basis that it competes

with the Quran for spiritual authority. There are even those who go so far as to say that

Muhammad himself has no spiritual authority except that to deliver the Quran; they reject any

significance of their prophetssunnah, or practices. These people have had many different names

historically, but today can be identified by the name Quranists or Quran Alone Muslims.

The purpose of the present paper to present the history, purpose, and structure of hadith

literature, and to additionally present the Quranist argument and practice. To this end, I reference

Hadith as Scriptureby Aisha Y. Musa and The Canonization of al-Bukhari and Muslimby

Jonathon Brown. Additionally, I occasionally have made recourse to the Sahih al-Bukhariand

Sahih Muslimthemselves for examples.

Hadith collections emerged out of the broader Hanbalite tradition of legal theory that can

also be termed ahl al-hadithwhich means partisans of hadith (Brown 50). Scholars in this

tradition rejected the ability of individual reason (ray) to produce authoritative rulings. Hanbal

is quoted as saying, You hardly see anyone applying reason, except that there lies, in his heart,

some deep-seated resentment. A weak narration from the Prophet is thus dearer to me than the


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use of reason (Brown 50). Hanbal died in 241 AH, and at this time the scholarship regarding

Hadith was primarily focused on authenticity, not authoritativeness: the earliest surviving works

from the ahl al-hadith were written by al-Shafii, who died in 204 AH, and there are no surviving

opposing texts from those who al-Shafii terms alh al-kalamor partisans of speech [of Allah]

(Musa 20). Moreover while earlier caliphs supported alh al-kalam, things changed in 232 AH

when al-Mutawakkil was made Caliph. Al-Mutawakkil and his successors supported the use of

ahadith instead of individual reasoning (Musa 63). In this time, the two most important hadith

collections were created. The first was collected by al-Bukhari, who died in 256 AH, and the

second was collected by Muslim bin al-Hajjaj, who died in 261 AH. These men, who were

disciples of Hanbal, sought to only collect the ahadith with the strongest isnads,or chains of

transmission (Brown 54-55). These ahadith are calledsahih, meaning authentic, and the

collections are called Sahih Bukhari and SahihMuslim. These collections, along with four

other non-sahihcolections compiled by students of Bukhari and Muslim, form the Kutub al-

Sittahwhich is taken as canon by most Sunni Muslims (Musa 63, Brown 55). These six

collections are important to the practice of Sunni Islam.

The hadith inform Islams practices by providing clarification for statements from the

Quran. For example, the hadith not only codify the five pillars of Islam, but also provide the

specific information concerning their practice. Specifically, the pillars are defined in the hadith

of Gabriel which is the 50th

hadith in Sahih al-Bhukari. In this hadith, the angel Gabriel, in

disguise, comes to Muhammad and asks him what faith and Islam are, prompting Muhammad to

speak about the five pillars (Al-Bukhari 81-82). However, it takes many, many more ahadith to

clarify the specific nature of what Muhammad means. With regards to the practice of prayer, al-

Bukhari has two books (8th

and 9th

) comprising 150 chapters of ahadith. Muslim, over three


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books, provides 183 chapters of ahadith expounding on almsgiving, fasting, and pilgrimage to

Mecca. There are additionalsahihhadith about nearly every aspect of Islam; the English text of

Sahih Muslim is about 1800 pages. Such a large volume of sayings complicates the religion

enormously.

Each hadith is composed of two parts. The first is the isnad, sometimes calledsabad,

which is the train of transmission from the writer to the prophet. The second part is the called

the matnand is the actual hadith or report (Newby 70). Many different classifications of hadith

exist, but the most important aresahih, hasan, and daif, meaning authentic, good, and

weak. A hadith may be classified as weak if its isnadis muallaq, or disconnected. Moreover,

hadith collections are organized in two ways (Brown 50-51). A collection can be musnad,

arranged by narrator, or musannaf, arranged by topic. To give further example, the eighteenth

hadith in Sahih Muslimis:

It is narrated on the authority of ('Abdullah) son of Umar (may Allah be pleased with

them) that the Holy Prophet (may peace of Allah be upon him) said: (The superstructure

of) al-Islam is raised on five (pillars), i. e. the oneness of Allah, the establishment of

prayer, payment of Zakat, the fast of Ramadan, Pilgrimage (to Mecca).

A person said (to 'Abdullah b. Umar the narrator): Which of the two precedes the other-

Pilgrimage or the fasts of Rarnadan? Upon this he (the narrator) replied: No (it is not the

Pilgrimage first) but the fasts of Ramadan precede the Pilgrimage. (Muslim 66)

The first part of this account which links the saying back to Muhammad, is the isnad. The actual

text of the hadith, here commenting on the five pillars of Islam, is the matn. Sahih Muslimis a


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musannafcollection, so this hadith is presented with three other ahadith under the heading of,

Concerning the Saying of the Apostle: Islam is founded on five fundaments (Muslim 66-67).

The hadith literature was not always the basis for mainstream Muslim thought. In fact,

until around 232 AH, the alh al-hadith were unpopular. During the Rashidun years especially,

the idea of collecting and writing down hadith was looked down upon. There are several reports

about the Caliph Umar regarding his views on hadith. The first story comes from Ibn Sad:

Umar wanted to write the Traditions, so he spent a month praying for guidance; and

afterward, he became determined to write them. But then he said: I recalled a people

who wrote a book, then they dedicated themselves to it to it and neglected the Book of

God (Musa 23).

This represents a major fear of the early Muslims. As leader of the Ummah, Umar was worried

that codifying and canonizing hadith would result in the community placing less importance on

the Quran. Ibn Sad also narrates a more strikingtale regarding Umar and the hadith:

The Hadith multiplied during the time of Umar; then he called on the people to bring

them to him, and when they brought them to him, he ordered them to be burned.

Afterward, he said, a Mishna like the Mishna of the People of the Book (Musa 24).

Here, Umar compares Hadith literature unfavorably to theMishna, which is the written

collection of the Oral Torah. It is part of the Talmud, which is the second most important text in

Judaism. Ibn Sad also narrates one final tradition regarding Umar, which illustrates his

unilateral opposition to ahadith, as opposed to just written ahadith.

We were headed toward Kufa and 4Umar accompanied us as far as Sirar. Then he made

ablutions, washing twice, and said: Do you know why I have accompanied you? We


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said: Yes, we are companions of Gods messenger (peace and blessings be upon him).

Then, he said: You will be coming to the people of a town for whom the buzzing of the

Quran is as the buzzing of bees. Therefore, do not distractthem with the Madiths, and

thus engage them. Bare the Quran and spare the narration from GodsMessenger (peace

and blessings be upon him)! Go and I am your partner. (Musa 26)

Although the Quran espouses a relatively simple and easy religion, it seemsthat Umar was well

aware of how attributing authority to ahadith can complicate things. It wasnt until long after

Umar that the ahl al-hadithgained momentum and support.

The earliest works we have in opposition to this viewpoint are from al-Shafii and Ibn

Qutayba (d. 204 and 276 AH respectively) (Musa 62). Shafii wrote primarily to convince

opponents that accepting the hadith as authoritative was required to be a Muslim. Moreover,

Shafii and Qutayba are the sources for the arguments of early Quranists, since none of their

writings have survived (Musa 18). Shafiis pro-hadith arguments can be found in hisRisalaand

inKutub Jimaal-ilm,of which a translation is provided in MusasHadith as Scripture.

Although the work has four sections, two are particularly relevant: The Section relating the

Doctrine of the Group that Rejects all Reports and The Section Relating the Opinion of Those

who Reject Isolated Reports (Musa 114-148). Shafii argues in favor of what Aisha Musa calls

duality of revelation (Musa 2). This is the idea that the authority of the hadith implicit in

accepting that the prophetic sunnah is revelatory in nature. He does this by arguing that the word

hikma, translated as wisdom, refers to the prophetic sunnah. He then appeals to Quran 62:2:


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It is He who has sent amongst the unlettered a Messenger from among them, to rehearse

to them His Signs, to sanctify them, and to instruct them in the Book and Wisdom,

although they had previously been in manifest error.

By this he argues that thesunnahis indeed a revelation. Acceptance of this argument, and

consequently the hadith literature has led to modern Muslim law and theology.

Debate concerning the authority of the hadith might have subsided after 300 AH, but the

ahl al-kalamstill exist today. The so called Quran alone Muslims, or ahl al-Quran, are of

particular note. These people object to particularly embarrassing ahadith, or to the notion of a

non-Quran religious authority. They face persecution not only incountries like Egypt, but also

in theDar al-Harb(Musa 83). Rashad Khalifa, the most radical Quranist from the modern era,

was killed at Tucson, Arizona in 1990. He and his peers argued using various ayat from the

Quran. The most commonly referenced ayat are those, like 75:16-19, that can be used to argue

that Muhammad had no duty or authority but delivering the Quran (Musa 91).Additionally,

Quranists also commonly cite those ayat that speak on the perfection, finality, and completeness

of the Quran.They also reference those ahadith which are bothsahihand embarrassing in an

effort to show how the hadith cannot be divine revelation. For example, one absurd hadith from

Sahih Muslimis in book 28:

Buraida reported on the authority of his father that Allahs Apostle (may peace be upon

him) said: He who played chess is like one who died his hand with the flesh and blood of

swine (Muslim 1385).

The question remains, How can these people practice Islam without the prophetic

sunnahto describe the specifics of their faith? The answer is ultimately that these specifics are


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unnecessary, and that Quran as a whole is sufficient. Where as in Sunni Islam, each prayer and

each rakaahof the prayer is prescribed. The Quranist viewpoint is that any prayer is valid, as

long as it satisfies what is said in the Quran (Jaff). Similarly these people also find the

appropriate doctrine regarding the other tenets of Muslim faith in the Quran. The biggest

difference between these Quranists and the Sunnis is that the Quranists embrace rayor

individual reasoning about religious practices.

Ultimately, those Muslims who reject the Hadith still remain a minority. That said, their

existence is an indicator that the question of the hadith is more than a question for historians of

Muslim law and theology. I have attempted to cover as much of the early debate as I could

reasonably capture, but lack of primary sources obscures the earliest arguments from us. I have

also tried to include, if only briefly, the chief players and vocabulary in the study of hadith

literature.


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Bibliography

Brown, Jonathan. he anoniation of l-ukhr and uslim the ormation and unction of

the unn adth anon. Leiden: Brill, 2007. Print.

Jaff, Dana. Quranist Prayer. International Quranic Center. Web. 13 December 2014.

Khan, Muhammad Muhsin. a l-ukhr he ranslation of the eanings of ahih l-

Bukhari : Arabic-English. Riyadh-Saudi Arabia: Darussalam Pub. & Distr., 1997. Print.

Musa, Aisha Y.adth as cripture iscussions on the uthority of rophetic raditions in

Islam. 1st ed. New York, N.Y.: Palgrave Macmillan, 2008. Print.

Newby, Gordon Darnell.A Concise Encyclopedia of Islam. Oxford: Oneworld, 2002. Print.

Sahih Muslim. N.p.: Abd-al-Hamid Siddiqui, 2009. Web. 13 Dec. 2014.

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a short history of the hadith

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