The mufassireen have mentioned that this verse indicated the preservation of Ahadith as well as the preservation of the quran. Because one can not understand the quran without taking into consideration the words and the actions of the prophet (s). If quran was all we needed, Allah could have sent the quran down to the earth with out intermediaries like the Prophet (s). The only reason of the prophet (s) coming is that we follow his examples. And the ahadith are the embodiment of his examples.
Now, people who claim that ahadith were not preserved like the quran was are complete idiots. and they have not studied the methods of preservation of ahadith. If one studied how the ahadith were preserved, THERE WOULD BE NO DOUBT THAT ALLAH HAS PROTECTED THE SAYINGS OF THE PROPHET (S) JUST AS HE HAS PROTECTED THE QURAN.
Well, first, let’s look why the quran is authentic beyond the shadow of doubt. Quran, till the point it was ordered to be written down during the time of abu bakr and completion of compilation at the time of Uthman, the chain of narrators, if you will, were mutawaatir. meaning a huge number of people had memorized the quran word by word so much so that there could not be any discrepancy in it whatsoever.
what people dont know is that a lot of the ahadith that are mutawaatir are also of the same category. now, the difference is, as the quran would reveal, people would memorize it from the prophet (S). but since ahadith consists of the daily actions and the sayings of the prophet (s) it would obviously be impractical for 100s of people to be with the prophet (s) all the time. and its also impractical that whenever the prophet (s) would utter a single word, everyone would try to memorize it.
you can memorize the quran as it is revealed but how can you memorize every word a person has spoken in his entire life? you possibly cant. and at times the prophet (s) would be accompanied by a single companion where he would instruct him to do something. but you dont expect that companion to memorize every word the prophet (s) spoke while he was with him abd tell everyone else in the masjid. it just doesn’t work since the prophet (s) is a man and his speech is of a much much larger quantity than the quantity of the words of the quran.
but even then, the sahabah in medinah, would at times write down the words of the prophet (s), though not 24/7 a person woudl walk around him with a pencil and paper and record every action.
so the problem that arises is when the sahabah were passing away and the fitnah broke out, people started to claim that prophet (s) said this and he (s) said that. they couldnt do this with quran because every bit of quran is memorized, but they can do it with hadith because there isnt a single person who was with the prophet(s) for all 23 years of his prophethood, spending every second and minute with him.
so what our scholars did is that they created a completely new science of validating and authenticating ahadith. and this science of authentication is unique to this ummah and will never be done again. and this science is so precise that if anyone studies into it, he/she will realize that there is no way we can reject the saying of the prophet (s) because we know every person in the link of the chain who has narrated the hadith going back to the prophet (s).
and as a matter of fact, the mutawaatir ahadith that have been passed down through generation by its exact matn, just in the same league of authenticity as the quran. its inconcieveable for so many pious people to lie and agree upon a lie and conspire.
so point of my post is, if people just shut up when they dont have the knowledge to speak, it would be good for themselves and good for others. as the scholars said, "an ignorant person harms himself and others around him as an enemy harms another enemy."
Masha'Allah. I enjoy your posts. Keep it up. Ma'salaam.
Posted by
Nawab |
3:50 PM
salaam!
Posted by
khadija |
8:40 PM