Imam Mahdi

WHAT IS HADITH?

   Reported sayings or actions or traditions of Mohammad (Peace be upon him) , together with the tradition of its chain of transmission that are not part of the Qur'an.

   People during Huzoor's (S.A.W.) time and even 100-200 years after Huzoor (S.A.W.) , used to memorize his sayings and writing of Hadith was not common at that time.

   As Huzoor (S.A.W.) left ,many wicked people began to say false things by adding the name of Huzoor (S.A.W.) ,so that they could please the kings and in this way ,the sayings of Huzoor (S.A.W.) got mixed with false things.

   So few people came forward and decided that the words of Huzoor (S.A.W.) should reach the people in its pure form without any alteration .Thus the words of Huzoor (S.A.W.) were recorded in the form of books and the Sahih Hadith was established.

   The Sahih Hadith is a standard parameter for the people to know the authenticity of any other Hadiths.The narrators of this category of Hadith were pious and strong. So all other category of Hadiths are judged based on this ‘meter’ only. If the content is more in other Hadith compared to the Sahih Hadith,then they are removed or not considered.

   Sahih Hadith were collected by six pious people namely – Bukhari,Muslim,Tirmizi,Abu Dawood, Nisai,Ibne Majah.These were the people who decided to deliver Huzoor (S.A.W.) words in its original form without any mixing and on the basis of sound narrators.

   The collections gathered by these people were named after their name and later was collectively termed as six Authentic Hadiths or simply “Sahae Sitta”

   Till now the status of these six books are above all the other Hadith books written before or after it. The reason being that the muhaddith(hadith expert) of these Hadiths got the narrators whose chain finally reached Huzoor (S.A.W.) .After these six books ,the remaining muhaddith (hadith expert) didn’t get such narrations and the hadith collected by them were picked from Sahih hadith (Sahae Sitta) or from books being written before Sahae Sitta. The later Hadiths also contain some weak narrations which were omitted by either Sahae Sitta or books before them.

   That is why the muslim community gives priority to Sahae Sitta over all Hadith Books & thus ‘ Sahae Sitta’ is a standard parameter for the checking of hadiths.

   Also, the book which is given priority after ‘Sahae Sitta’ is Musnad Ahmad collected by Ahmad bin Hanbal. He was 30 years older than Bukhari & has written Musnad Ahmad before ‘ Sahae Sitta’.

   But it was not included in the Sahae Sitta as it contained many weak narrations. But after Sahae Sitta, this book is preferred over other books as it was written close to Huzoor's (S.A.W.) time.

    The rest of hadith books like Hakim, Tibrani, Durre Mansoor, Kanzul Amaal, Mishkat etc. were written 200-700 years later compared to Sahae Sitta. Hence the amount of weak narrations is more as they were collected long after Huzoor's (S.A.W.) time and also one can’t get the narrators whose chain can reach Huzoor (S.A.W.) . So these books contain many weak and fabricated narrations.

   Now, it is clear that no one has the right to challenge the hadiths mentioned in books other than Sahae Sitta against that of Sahae Sitta and thus to obtain the words of Huzoor (S.A.W.) , the best hadith book is “Sahae Sitta”.

Ranks Among Sahae Sitta.

   There are ranks among Sahae Sitta also. Bukhari is given topmost priority followed by Muslim, Tirmizi, Abu Dawood, Nisai and finally Ibn e Majah

   If there are similar narrations mentioned in all the six books with little bit of change of words , then the narrations of Bukhari would be preferred. Similarly, if there are similar narrations mentioned in Muslim, Tirmizi, Abu Dawood then muslim’s narration is preferred. Ibne Majah’s narration is preferred only when this kind of narration is not present in any of the remaining five books.

   These are the general guidelines followed by the muslim community regarding the understanding of hadiths.

   Hadiths are broadly classified into two types :

• Hadith based on deeds (day to day action).
• Hadiths based on prophecy.

   So naturally inorder to know about Imam Mahdi (A.S.), we have to look into the hadiths based on prophecies.

What is Prophecy?

   Prophecy is the “knowledge of the unseen”. From Quran we come across that the events that happen in past or that will happen in future are the knowledge of unseen.

References :

• This is a part of the news of the Ghaib (unseen, i.e. the news of the past nations of which you have no knowledge) which We inspire you with (O Muhammad (S.A.W.)) . (Al Imran, 44)
• This is of the news of the Ghaib (unseen) which We reveal by Inspiration to you (O Muhammad (S.A.W.) ). You were not (present) with them when they arranged their plan together, and (also, while) they were plotting. (Yusuf, 102)
• Say (O Muhammad) : "I possess no power of benefit or hurt to myself except as Allah wills. If I had the knowledge of the Gaib (unseen) , I should have secured for myself an abundance of wealth, and no evil should have touched me. (Araf, 188)

   Since prophecies are the events that will happen in future, therefore they are knowledge of unseen.

   From where to obtain prophecy?

   The rule followed is same as that of any general hadith understanding, that is obtain it from Sahae Sitta. But there are some notable points.

Firstly :

   Suppose if a prophecy is mentioned in one of the weak hadiths and it gets fulfilled, then that weak narration is considered strong because prophecies are knowledge of unseen and so if the narration was not correct then it would not have got fulfilled. Investigation is the result of human effort which sometimes may be incorrect. But this happens rarely that instead of sahih hadith, narration of weak hadith gets fulfilled.

   If there are same prophecies mentioned in any sahih hadith, pointing to the same event but slight variation of words then if anyone of the hadith gets fulfilled then that prophecy is considered to be fulfilled.

Note :
   One cannot challenge any prophecy of weak hadith against sahih hadith. That is, if there is a prophecy of an event present in both sahih hadith and weak hadith and if only the sahih hadith’s prophecies gets fulfilled, then one cannot argue that the prophecy is not fulfilled because weak hadith’s narration has not been yet fulfilled. If the narration is fulfilled in sahih hadith, then the prophecy is fulfilled irrespective of the fact that whether it has been fulfilled in weak narration or not.But if the weak hadith’s narration gets fulfilled alongwith sahih hadith, then it can be mentioned while describing the completion of the prophecy.

   One even cannot guarantee that the given hadith will happen in the way One has interpreted because prophecies are the knowledge of the unseen and before its happening one can only assume that it might happen in this way but cannot tell with full confidence that it will happen in the way assumed. For example, Huzoor (S.A.W.) was prophesized by Moses (A.S.) in Torah that “surely he will come near Faran mountain with 10000 pious men and having a sparkling law in his right hand.” Now by reading the above prophecy one can assume that he might come near Faran mountain but one cannot say it with certainly because we know that in prophecy name of place doesn’t generally match. And this was happened here also. Huzoor (S.A.W.) came in mecca which is a mountaineous region but nowhere in mecca was a mountain called faran during Huzoor (S.A.W.) time. Hence we can only assume about the occurence of a prophecy but cannot tell it with certainty.Those who try to say it with certainty then they are claiming that they have knowledge of the unseen. Only Allah knows the unseen and his prophets know only that portion of unseen which Allah has revealed to them. Apart from this, from Quran and sahih hadith we come to know that satan can steal a portion of the unseen and then feed it into the ears of fortune-teller and thereby he mixes it with hundreds of false talks and present it to the people. Thus if a person is arguing that the prophecy will be fulfilled as per his assumption then he is claiming that he is either a prophet, satan or a fortune-teller. And if not all these,then he surely is a liar.

Knowledge of Prophecies

   Now, to understand a Hadith related to prophesies, we have to understand certain fact:

Contradiction in the names of individuals in prophecies:

   Often the name of the individual that has figured out in prophesies does not match when prophesies are unfolded.However, sometimes meanings of the name matches or sometimes qualities, which the name signifies, matches.

Example:

   Once Umar (R.A.) asked the Father of the church," Is there anything related to me written in your Book?"
   Father replied that in his Book, he(Umar) has been prophesized by the name KARAN, which means strong, strict & trustworthy. And, as all of us know, these qualities were found in Umar (R.A.).

Similarly, HAZRAT Muhammad (S.A.W.) has been prophesized by the name, ‘PARACLET’. Paraclet is a Hebrew word which means praiseworthy. And Muhammad, which is an Arabic word, also means praiseworthty.

   Thus from the above two examples, it is clear that sometimes meanings of the name matches or sometimes qualities, which the name signifies, matches.