Claim that the Sunnah cannot be trusted

[KI]

Some people reject the Sunnah on the basis that there are many weak and fabricated ahaadeeth and that the fabrications of many liars weaken the Sunnah and make it such that it cannot be trusted. What is your opinion about this claim?

Praise be to Allaah.

This is the view of some heretics and misguided people, both in the past and nowadays. In modern times, those who expressed this view include Saalih Abu Bakr in his book al-Adwaa’ al-Qur’aaniyyah; Husayn Ahmad Ameen in Daleel al-Muslim al-Hazeen; Ahmad Ameen in Fajr al-Islam; ‘Abd-Allaah al-Na’eem in Nahwa Tatweer al-Tashree’ al-Islaami; Sa’eed al-‘Ashmaawi in Haqqeeqat al-Hijaab; Saalih al-Wardaani in his misleading book Rihlati min al-Sunnah ila al-Shee’ah; ‘Abd al-Jawaad Yaaseen in al-Sultah fi’l-Islam; Nasr Abu Zayd in Imaam al-Shaafa'i; Zakariya ‘Abbaas Dawood in Ta’ammulaat fi’l-Hadeeth; Hawlat Nahr in Diraasaat Muhammadiyyah; Maurice Bucaille in Diraasat al-Kutub al-Muqaddisah; Murtada al-‘Askar in Khamsoon wa Mi’ah Sahaabi Mukhtalaq; Dr. Mustafa Mahmood in Maqaalaat ‘an al-Shafaa’ah.

We say: it is true that there were fabricators and liars who made up words and attributed them to the Messenger of Allaah (peace and blessings of Allaah be upon him), but the matter is not quite so simple as imagined by those doubters who also spread doubts among others. They are unaware of the facts about how the Muslims took care of the Sunnah. Alongside the fabricators, there were great numbers of narrators who were trustworthy and highly skilled, and a large number of scholars who surrounded the hadeeths of the Messenger of Allaah (peace and blessings of Allaah be upon him) with a strong barrier which was difficult for the liars to penetrate. By means of their vast knowledge and deep insight, these muhaddithoon (scholars of hadeeth) were able to spot the liars and understand their intentions and motives, and they were able to detect everything that was falsely attributed to the Messenger of Allaah (peace and blessings of Allaah be upon him). These fabricators were not given free rein to do as they wished with the ahaadeeth of the Prophet (peace and blessings of Allaah be upon him), and they were given no room to penetrate the ranks of trustworthy narrators of ahaadeeth without being detected.

Who else exposed the lies of these kaafirs, heretics and extreme innovators?

Who were the ones who gave us the definition of what is fabricated, the reasons for fabrication, different types of fabrications and the signs by which a fabricated report may be recognized? Who wrote so many books on this issue?

They are the guardians of Islam, the vicegerents and troops of Allaah on His earth. They are the brilliant scholars of whom Haaroon al-Rasheed spoke when he arrested a heretic and ordered that he be executed. The heretic said, “Why are you executing me?” Haaroon al-Rasheed said, “To rid the people of you.” The heretic said: “O Ameer al-Mu’mineen, what will you do about the thousand ahaadeeth – according to one report, four thousand ahaadeeth – which I have fabricated and spread among you, in which I made what is halaal haraam and what is haraam halaal, of which the Prophet uttered not one letter?” Haaroon al-Rasheed said to him: “What will you do, O enemy of Allaah, about Abu Ishaaq al-Fazaari and ‘Abd-Allaah ibn al-Mubaarak? They will go through them and sift them letter by letter.” (Tadhkirat al-Huffaaz by al-Dhahabi, 1/273; Taareekh al-Khulafaa’ by al-Suyooti, p. 174).

Professor Muhammad Asad said: “The existence of fabricated ahaadeeth cannot be taken to prove that the entire system of hadeeth is not to be trusted, because these fabricated ahaadeeth never deceived the muhadditheen as some European critics claimed, oversimplifying the matter, and as was echoed by some who claim to be Muslims.” (al-Islam ‘ala Muftaraq al-Tareeq, p. 96)

We will end this discussion by quoting what was said by Imaam Ibn al-Qayyim al-Jawziyyah: Imaam Abu’l-Muzaffar al-Sam’aani said: “If they say: there are too many reports in the hands of the people and they have become confused, we say: no one is confused except those who are ignorant. Those who have knowledge of them (the reports) check them as stringently as those who deal with money check dirhams and dinars. So they single out (and discard) the false reports and keep the good reports. If there happens to be a narrator who made a mistake, this will not go unnoticed by the brilliant scholars of hadeeth. These scholars listed the mistakes made in both the isnaad (chain of narrators) and matn (texts) of reports; so you can see that for each narrator they made a list of the mistakes that he had made and the letters that he had mispronounced. If the mistakes of the narrators – in both the isnaad and the matn – did not go unchecked, then how could the fabricated ahaadeeth manufactured by the heretics have slipped past those brilliant scholars? How could people have narrated ahaadeeth from heretics without the scholars noticing? That is the view of some heretics, but no one would say such a thing except one who is ignorant, misguided, an innovator and a liar who wants to undermine the saheeh ahaadeeth and true reports of the Prophet (peace and blessings of Allaah be upon him) and confuse ignorant people by means of this lie. There is no evidence for rejecting the reports of the Messenger of Allaah (peace and blessings of Allaah be upon him) that is weaker or more impossible than this. The one who voices this view deserves to be silenced and expelled from the Muslim lands.

Mukhtasar al-Sawaa’iq al-Mursalah, 2/561

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Truth will always prevail over falsehood.

[dawacentre]

Those who reject the Sunnah are Kafirun.

Anyway yet again the shias have taken the path of slander and lies. Lots of their 'ulamas' have proven to be kafirun but these shiars denied or avoided these vital questions.

All sincere Muslims should research into their Aqeedah and confront them.

Ma'salam

[KI]

Dawacentre,
I agree with you brother. They should be concerned with their Aqeedah instead of waisting their time on trivial things. The 4 madhabs have attested to the fact that they are outside of Islam because of their Aqeedah.
May Allah saves us from false Aqeedah. Ameen.
________________________________________
Truth will alway prevail over falsehood.

[Avilos]

You have both shown your ignorance once again.

You quote shia hadith books yet you imply the shia do not follow the sunnah?

You have seen myself and bro FYI quoting almost exclusively hadith from sunni books, yet you imply the shia reject the sunnah?

Dawacentre the Prince of slander and lies comes out with another slander and a lie, and you by attesting to it KI join him in his ranks.

[Quran 104:1] Woe to every slanderer, defamer,
[Quran 104:2] Who amasses wealth and considers it a provision (against mishap);
[Quran 104:3] He thinks that his wealth will make him immortal.
[Quran 104:4] Nay! he shall most certainly be hurled into the crushing disaster,
[Quran 104:5] And what will make you realize what the crushing disaster is?
[Quran 104:6] It is the fire kindled by Allah,
[Quran 104:7] Which rises above the hearts.
[Quran 104:8] Surely it shall be closed over upon them,
[Quran 104:9] In extended columns.

[abc_xyz]

who claimed what suuna cannot be trusted apart from shamsul afren?

[FYI]

HADITH

The principle that the hadith possesses validity, as attested by the Qur'an, is not at all disputed among Shi'ites or in fact among all Muslims.

But because of the failure of some of the early rulers of Islam in preserving and guarding the hadith, and the excesses of a group among the companions and followers of the Prophet in propagating hadith literature, the corpus of hadith came to face a certain number of difficulties.

On the one hand, the caliphs of the time prevented the writing down and recording of the hadith and ordered any pages containing texts of hadith to be burned. Sometimes also any increase in activity in the transmission and study of hadith was forbidden. In this way a certain number of hadith were forgotten or lost and a few were even transmitted with a different or distorted meaning. On the other hand, another tendency also prevailed among another group of the companions of the Holy Prophet who had had the honor of seeing his presence and actually hearing his words. This group, which was respected by the caliphs and the Muslim community, began an intense effort to propagate the hadith. This was carried to such an extent that sometimes hadith overruled the Qur'an and the injunction of a Qur'anic verse was even considered abrogated by some people through a hadith. Often the transmitters of hadith would travel many miles and hear all the difficulties of travelling in order to hear a single saying.

A group of outsiders who had worn the dress of Islam and also some of the enemies within the ranks of Islam began to change and distort some of the hadith and thus diminished the reliability and validity of the hadith that was then heard and known. For this very reason Islamic scholars began to think of a solution. They created the sciences concerned with the biography of learned men and chains of transmission of hadith in order to be able to discriminate between true and false hadith.

The Method of Shi'ism in Authenticating the Hadith

Shi'ism, in addition to seeking to authenticate the chain of transmission of hadith, considers the correlation of the text of the hadith with the Qur'an as a necessary condition for its validity. In Shi'ite sources there are many hadith of the Prophet and the Imams with authentic chains of transmission which themselves assert that a hadith contrary to the Qur'an has no value. Only that hadith can be considered valid which is in agreement with the Qur'an.

Basing itself on these hadiths, Shi'ism does not act upon those hadiths which are contrary to the text of the Qur'an. As for hadiths whose agreement or disagreement cannot be established according to instructions received from the Imams they are passed by in silence without being accepted or rejected.

Needless to say there are also within Shi'ism those who, like a group among the Sunnis act on any hadith whatsoever which they happen to find in different traditional sources.

The Method of Shi'ism in Following the Hadith

A hadith heard directly from the mouth of the Prophet or one of the Imams is accepted as is the Qur'an. As for hadiths received through intermediaries, the majority of Shi'ites act upon them if their chain of transmission is established at every step or if there exists definite proof concerning their truth, and, if they are concerned with principles of doctrine which require knowledge and certainty, according to the text of the Qur'an. Other than these two kinds of hadith, no other hadith has any validity concerning principles of doctrine, the invalid hadith being called "tradition with a sincere transmitter" (khabar wahid). However, in establish in the injunctions of the Shari'ah, because of reasons that have been given, Shi'ites act also on a tradition which is generally accepted as reliable. Therefore, it can be said that for Shi'ism a certain and definitely established hadith is absolutely binding and must be followed, while a hadith which is not absolutely established but which is generally considered as reliable is utilized only in the elaboration of the in junctions of the Shari'ah.

[progressive]

To Determine whether Sunnah can be trusted or not, just look at what Imam Bukhari had to say about his own compilation of the sunnats/hadiths about 250 years after the time of the Prophet.

Bukhari had 600,000(not a typo) hadiths to go thru and finally he chose less than 1% and rejected the rest or 99%+ as fabrications. Any mathematician or statistician will tell you that any sample that has 99% + Rejects cannot be considered Reliable.