Hadith Collection When It Was Prohibited
Earlier on while the Quran was being revealed it was prohibited to write down hadith but then later on the permission was granted. It’s quite natural that the people who had the honor of the company of Prophet Muhammad SAW would narrate certain things to others later on so a complete prohibition wasn’t feasible anyway.
Hadith collection was indeed prohibited throughout, as depicted in Islamic history because Prophet S.A.W did not leave for us any other book other than QURAN ONLY. He did not leave any book on hadith(s) authorized by him, but he did leave his way (sunnah) in practice among thousands of sahabas so that we can follow quran as explained by Prophet S.A.W. He did explain quran in words and in practice which was witnessed by many 1st generation of muslims. It was upto faqih (scholars) like imam abu hanifa, imam maliki, imam shafa’i, imam ahmed ibn hanbal and many other 2nd/3rd generation imams (scholars) to develop fiqh-us-sunnah so that we follow quran as prophet S.A.W explained it and showed us in practice and SAHABA followed it. So “Follow ALLAH and follow Prophet” means follow Quran as prophet S.A.W followed it and explained it to the ummah. Much later, so many hadiths books came to picture and some of our scholars put one or more of these books at par with quran. that’s where the destruction of UMMAH began, in my opinion. Insha ALLAH the day we resolve this correctly, Muslim will be FATIH (victorious) ummah again on this earth.