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Chapter Two. The Adith And I. The News

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5.
\"The Preservation Of The Prophetic Practice\" ("SUNNA")

We have indicated that the "adth" transmits the "sunna", the tradition or practice of the Prophet, and even if a "adth" is not in itself true, it may still transmit "sunna"; it may illustrate what the Prophet would approve of, or what he might have said had he been asked.

The preservation of the "sunna" has been Islam's way of maintaining its historical continuity, its link with the Apostolic period. One of the important ways this has been done is by the study and criticism of the "adth".

The following essay is by the fourteenth-century savant and historian 'Abd al-Rahmn Ibn Khaldn (died A.h. 808/a.d. 1406), a Spanish Arab of Tunis, who was a professor of "adth" and jurisprudence as well as a historian, statesman and diplomat. It serves to illustrate the categories within which the religious scholars have operated, and the way in which they have conceived their task.

The sciences concerned with Prophetic traditions ("adth") are numerous and varied. One of them concerns abrogating. The permission to abrogate previous statements and the occurrence of abrogation have been established.... God said: "Whenever We abrogate a verse or consign it to oblivion, We bring one that is better, or as good." (Sra 2:100)

Two traditions may be mutually exclusive, and it may be difficult to reconcile them.... If in such a case it is known that one is earlier than the other, it is definite that the later abrogates (it).

This is one of the most important and difficult of the sciences of tradition. Al-Zuhr said: "It has been a baffling and impossible task for the jurists to distinguish traditions of the Messenger of God abrogating others from those that were abrogated by them."

Another of the sciences of tradition is the knowledge of

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the norms that leading "adth"-scholars have invented in order to know the chains of transmitters, the (individual) transmitters, their names, how the transmission took place.... (The student may verify the tradition) by scrutinizing the chains of transmitters. For that purpose one may use such knowledge of the probity, accuracy, thoroughness and lack of... negligence as the most reliable Muslims describe a transmitter as possessing....

The highest grade of transmitted material is called "sound" ("a") by the scholars. Next comes "good" ("asan"). The lowest (acceptable) grade is "weak" ("a'f"). The classification includes also "skipping the first transmitter's name" ("mursal"), "omitting one link" (munqai'), "omitting two links" ("mu'al"), "affected by some infirmity" ("mu'allal"), "singular" ("shdhdh"), "unusual" ("gharb") and "singular and suspect" ("munkar"). In some cases there is a difference of opinion as to whether (traditions so described) should be rejected. In other cases there is general agreement that (they should be rejected). The same is the case with (traditions with) sound chains. In some cases, there is general agreement as to their acceptability and soundness, whereas in other cases, there is difference of opinion. "adth" scholars differ greatly in their explanations of these terms.

Then there follows the discussion of terms applying to the texts of the traditions. A text may be "unusual" ("gharb"), ambiguous ("mushkil"), "affected by misspelling or misreading, containing homonyms" ("muftariq") or "containing homographs."...

The purpose of the discipline is a noble one. It is concerned with the knowledge of how to preserve the traditions ("sunna")... until it is definite which are to be accepted and which are to be rejected.

The Companions of the Prophet and the men of the second generation who transmitted the "Sunna" were well known in the cities of Islam. There were transmitters in the "Hijz", in al-Bara and al-Kfa, and then in Syria and Egypt. They were famous in their time. The transmitters of the "Hijz" had fewer links in their chains of transmitters (than others) and were sounder because they were reluctant to accept (as reliable

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transmitters
) those who were obscure and whose conditions were not known.

At the beginning, knowledge of the religious Law was entirely based on (oral) tradition. It involved no speculation, no use of opinion, and no intricate reasoning.... Mlik wrote the "Muwaa'" according to "ijz" tradition, in which he laid down the principal laws on the basis of sound, generally agreed upon (material). He arranged the work according to juridical categories.

There was Muhammad ibn Ism'l al-Bukhr, the leading "adth" scholar of his time. In his "Musnad al-a"... he published the orthodox traditions according to subject. He combined all the different ways of the ijzis, Iraqs and Syrians, accepting the material on which they were all agreed but excluding material concerning which there were differences of opinion.... His work thus comprised 7,200 traditions of which 3,000 are repeated. In each chapter, he kept separate the rescensions with the different chains of interpreters belonging to them.

Then came the "imm" Muslim b. al-Hajjj al-Qushayr. He composed his Musnad al-Sahib in which he followed al-Bukhr in that he transmitted the material that was generally agreed upon....

Scholars have corrected the two (authors), noting the cases of the sound traditions not included in their works.

Ab Dawd al-Sijistn, Ab 'Isa al-Tirmidh, and Ab 'Abd al-Rahmn al-Nasal wrote works that included more than merely "sound" traditions. Their intent was to include all traditions that fulfilled amply the conditions making them actionable traditions... to serve as a guide to orthodox practice.

These are the collections of traditions that are used as reference works in Islam. They are the chief orthodox works on traditions. [Ibn Khaldn does not mention the "Sunan" of Ibn Mj (died A.h. 271/a.d. 886), usually considered the sixth orthodox work.--ED.] Other collections have been added to these five. At this time traditions are no longer published nor are (the publications of) traditions of former scholars corrected. Common experience attests that these numerous religious

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men, close to each other in time, were too capable and too firmly possessed of independent judgment to have neglected or omitted any tradition, so it is impossible that some later scholar might discover one. At this time one is concerned with correcting the principal written works and fixing the accuracy of their transmission....

Al-Bukhr s a occupies the chief place among them 42

Footnotes

91:42
Ibn Khaldn, "The Muqaddimah" (New York, 1958), translated by Franz Rosenthal, Vol. II, pp. 447-457, \"passim".
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