The Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) is narrated to have said: لاَ يُلْدَغُ الْمُؤْمِنُ مِنْ جُحْرٍ وَاحِدٍ مَرَّتَيْنِ A believer is not bitten from the same hole twice (Bukhari/ Muslim) The Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) made it clear in this narration that the...
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Click here to read part 4 Techniques in Averting Errors A number of measure have been adopted to insure that errors are kept to a minimum. For example the use of textual comparisons. Cross-comparisons were made between the hadiths of different students of a given scholar or the statements of a scholar made at different times....
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[Click here to read part 3] The Probity of Narrators (‘adaalatur ruwwaah) After establishing continuity it is necessary to establish the trustworthiness of narrators. Since one can only go by the overt indications it is stipulated that for someone to be ‘adl he must not be known to be a liar or accused of lying or an open fasiq...
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[Click here to read part 2] The Stringent Isnad Criteria Five strict conditions were set to rigorously assess the authenticity of a hadith. The early pioneer in this field, as in so many other fields of Islamic learning, was the great Imam Shafi’I who spelt out a methodology to verify authenticity. Before Shafi’I people were...
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[Click here to read the introduction] Historical background and the Birth of Isnad But before we discuss the key aspects of the hadith methodology I wish to recount the historical background of Isnad so that we can appreciate the context in which the Isnad was born and the problems and challenges Muslims faced in protecting the...
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[This is an article written by Ustadh Kamal Abu Zahra which explains the paramount importance and critical position of the "isnad" (chain of transmission between the final narrator and source of the narration) in Islam, in its role as a preserver of the Sunnah of the Prophet Mohammad (peace and blessings be upon him). Footnotes will...
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