From: paul@kuhub.cc.ukans.edu
Newsgroups: soc.religion.islam
Subject: Infallability, ahadith, sunnah, Qur'an
Date: 10 Oct 92 21:06:06 GMT
Organization: University of Kansas Academic Computing Services

G Huseini writes...

> ekrem@vlsivie.tuwien.ac.at (Ekrem Saban) said:
> >Subject:Re: aqeedah
> 
> >[...]
> >
> >   Allah is attributed with motion, and He descends (in a way
> >   which befits His greatness) every night during the last
> >   third of the night.  (See the hadeeth qudsi beginning
> >   "Ana 'ind THann 'abdee bee", and the other hadeeth
> >   concerning Allah's descension in the last third of the
> >   night.  Both are in either of "Forty Hadith" or "Forty
> >   Hadith Qudsi", translated by Izzidin Ibrahim.)
> >   Allah loves and feels wrath (3:31, 24:9).
> >
> >A hadith can't be considered or relied upon like an Ayat. There are
> >hadith' which are sahih, but could be better formulated or are even
> >wrongly formulated. This is possible, as the information for the
> >hadith comes from Allah, but the words are from a fallable man, our
> >Prophet (sav).
> 	
> 	Correction:
> 	1. I don't know how can a Muslim say something like that?
> 	   Who told you that the prophet salla-l-lahu ^alyhi wa sallam
> 	   was fallable?

From our own private e-mails you don't agree that there are four times
that the Prophet (saws) was corrected within the Qur'an; 66:1, 33:37,
80:1-10, 75:16-19. Your argument against 80:1-10 was very
unconvincing. You didn't choose to dispute 66:1 and also did not
specify how 33:37 could be construed otherwise than the text:

33:37

'And lo, [O Muhammad,] thou didst say unto the one to whom Allah had
shown favour and to whom thou hadst shown favour, "Hold on to thy
wife, and remain conscious of Allah!" And thus wouldst thou hide within
thyself something that Allah was about to bring to light - for thou
didst stand in awe of [what] people [might think], whereas Allah was
more worthy that thou shouldst stand in awe of him. [But] then when
Zayd had come to the end of his union with her We gave her to thee in
marriage, so that [in future] no blame should attach to the believers
for [marrying] the spouses of their adopted children when the latter
have come to the end of their union with them. And Allah's will was
done.'

> 	   You did not hear about what the scholars of al-'Islam
> 	   mentioned in their book and elaborated on: ^Ismat al-'Anbiya'--
> 	   The impeccability of the prophets.

It's called "hagiology" and is a very old Middle Eastern tradition
among Judaism, also.

> 	   Many many ^ulama' mentioned about that. It is obvious that 
> 	   ignorance is a dangerous disease. Take for example ash-Shifa
> 	   for al-Qadiy ^Iyad, al-^Aqidah at-Tahawiyyah for al-'imam
> 	   at-Tahawiyy, al-^Aqidah an-Nasafiyyah, ^Ismat al-'Anbiya'
> 	   for ar-Raziyy, Jawharat at-Tawhid for al-Bajuriyy,
> 	   al-'I^tiqad and al-Hiday for al-Bayhaqiyy  and many others.
> 	   The Muslim ^ulama' have said that the prophets are impeccable
> 	   from minor sin, major sins and al-kufr before and after
> 	   prophethood. They are truthful, trustworthy, intelligent and
> 	   convey the message. The have nice face and nice voices. They are
> 	   not attributes with degrading qualities or repulsive attitudes.
> 	   The are better than any other creation of Allah.

Interesting - how did they work around the ayat above mentioned?
Please be specific! Allah is quite specific in the following aya

33:38 in part
'and stand in awe of Him and hold none but Allah in awe: for none can
take count [of man's doings] as Allah does!'

Also note Isaiah 53:2 about Jesus and his beauty:

"For he shall grow up before him as a tender plant, and as a root out
of a dry ground: he hath no form nor comeliness; and when we shall see
him, there is no beauty that we should desire him."
 
> 	2. I have already put the proofs for the validity of the sunnah 
> 	   (hadith) of the prophet. I put most of the proofs from
>          al-Qur'an.

The Qur'an is the ultimate proof. If a hadith confirms the Qur'an well
and good.

> 	   It is proven that the hadith of the prophet is a
>          revelation.

If such was the case the hadith would have been incorporated into the
Qur'an. Otherwise you would be claiming that the Prophet (saws) and
the consensus of the companions after him were mistaken.

> 	   Remember this rule. This is mentioned by ash-Shafi^iyy and
> 	   quoted by al-Bayhaqiyy as mentioned by as-Siutiyy in Miftah
> 	   al-Jannah.
> 	   It does not make any sense to say that, Allah, the One Who
> 	   perfected al-Qur'an, did not perfect the sunnah of the
>          prophet.

If you concur that a genuine hadith is confirmed by the Qur'an you
must, by necessity, note that the Prophet (saws) could have only acted by
explicit direction from Allah as given in the Qur'an. Thus, when Allah
says

5:101-102

"Oh you who have attained to faith! Do not ask about matters which, if
they were to be made manifest to you might cause you hardship; for, if
you should ask about them while the Qur'an is being revealed, they
might be made mainfest to you. Allah has absolved [you from any
obligation] in this respect: for Allah is much-forgiving, forbearing.
(102) People before your time have indeed asked such questions - and
in result thereof have come to deny the truth."

the Prophet (saws) must have behaved accordingly. If an action or duty
isn't mentioned in the Qur'an Allah does not oblige us to do it and
will forgive us if we don't.


> 	   It is also kufr to believe that.
> 	   Some of the proofs for as-Sunnah are: 53:1-5,

Since the sunnah are not the revelation this cannot be true.

>  42:52-53

The revelation is the way to Allah, not the sunnah.

> 2:98

Again, you confuse the revelation with the sunnah, or do you claim
that Jibril (Gabriel) revealed the ahadith?

> 	   66, 24:62, 8:34, 59:7, 4:113, 9:122, 4:65 and others.

Again, you confuse revelation with hadith.
 
> 	3. Allah ordered us to follow the prophet when he was alive and
> 	   after his death. How do you think that one can follow the prophet
> 	   after his death wihtout knowing his sunnah (i.e. sayings,
> 	   actions, attributes, judgements, and acknowledgements)

Since you agree that the Prophet (saws) could only act from Allah's commands
in the Qur'an then you will find the Prophet's actions justified in
the Qur'an. Allah is the best of judges, and left us with 5:101-102,
so that He may instruct us.

> 	   If any Muslim doubts wether one has to follow the prophet, then
> 	   he rejected al-Qur'an and went out of al-'Islam.

By your own definitions you would rephrase this as "If any Muslim
doubts whether one has to follow the Qur'an then he went out of
al-Islam." I would agree.

> Rejecting the prophet is rejecting the belief in Allah. The prophet is the
> 	   one who guided us to the way for knowing Allah. If one degrades
> 	   the prophet,

By denying aya of the Qur'an you are rejecting both the Qur'an and the
Prophet (saws), and therefore belief in Allah.

> one is then rejecting al-Qur'an that the prophet 
> 	   conveyed.

And you seem to be rejecting the very concept you are trying to defend!

> Can't Allah make the prophet infallable? Of course,
> 	   He can.

Yet, according to the Qur'an the Prophet (saws) was corrected 4 times.
Therefore Allah chose to make the Prophet (saws) fallable.

> 	   Hence, one has to know how to follow the sunnah.

One must follow the Qur'an and the sunnah which confirm the Qur'an.
 	
> 	4. I think most of the confusion about the issue of following
> 	   the sunnah stems from the ignorance about the science of al-hadith.
> 	   Many people don't know the terms and techniques of this science.
> 	   How can someone say that the hadith is sahih but it is wrongly
> 	   formulated? This is a contradiction in terms.

Because most people differ from your definition of 'hadith' means that
there are other understandings of the definition of 'hadith'.

> This person is
> 	   saying: the prophet said this hadith but the prophet did not
> 	   say the right thing. Let me tell you that such saying is a 
> 	   rejection of the prophet's saying.

Only a rejection of the hadith, not the Qur'an and the Prophet's action.

> 	   You want to correct the prophet?

Allah did, 4 times in the Qur'an. Do you want to correct Allah? Allah
has specifically forbidden us to hold anyone else but Him in awe!

> Or do you want to correct the
> 	   narrators of his hadith?
> 	   You must be ashamed of yourself.

Allah knows what is in Ekrem's heart. You cannot.
 
> 	5. Because Allah ordered us to follow the prophet, Allah made it
> 	   possible to know the prophet's way.

through the Qur'an and the hadith which confirm the Qur'an.

> The scholars of al-hadith
> 	   worked hard to preserve the sunnah of the prophet and protect it
> 	   from the practices of other people. For this reason, they said that
> 	   some of the hadith are sahih, hasan, da^if or mawdu^. They 
> 	   classified the hadith into more than 63 category. They defined
> 	   their terms, their ways of investigation, the levels of
> 	   authenticity of the sunnah, and kept detailed history about
> 	   the relators of knowledge and sunnah. They evaluated these
> 	   relators, they named their teachers, their students, what they
> 	   related, their state when related the sunnah and how accurate
> 	   they were. They invented the knowledge of ar-Rijal. It is a 
> 	   a knowledge which searches about the authenticity of the relators
> 	   and their trustworthiness with particular terms and according
> 	   to specific ranks and levels of accuracy and trustworthiness.
> 	   It qualifies the terms used and how much one term differs from
> 	   the others. The scholars did that each century. One year after
> 	   the other until this same minute.

Since you admit that some ahadith were considered genuine earlier
and not considered genuine later you admit that there is genuine
reason for difference. Some sincere scholars were incorrect.

You also seem to indicate that you reject the notion of 63 hadith
classifications, UNLESS they boil down to two, those which confirm the
Qur'an and those which don't.

> 	   Don't think that Islamic knowledge is dead in the books.	   
> 	   Ash-Shafi^iyy said that all the sunnah of the prophet was 
> 	   documented and classified into its ranks. One scholar many some
> 	   others many know more. Ahmad bin Hanbal used to know BY HEART
> 	   about 1,200,000 hadith. He would give you the hadith and those
> 	   who narrated it strating from him and back. Al-Bukhariyy used
> 	   to know BY HEART about the same number. Yes one million and
> 	   Not all of them are sahih. They have to know the hadith and its
> 	   chain of all relators BY HEART so that one is considered muhaddith
> 	   or a hafiz.
> He has to have teachers to be able to discuss the issues
> 	   or else he is considered a journalist and not a ^alim.
> If he reads
> 	   from books and does not memorize, he is not a reference.

By your own advice, since you don't claim to be an 'alim,
shouldn't you stop posting?

> 	   Some of the scholars of this science were: Yahay bin Sa^id
> 	   al-Qattan, Yahya bin Ma^in, ^Aliyy bin al-Madiniyy, Ahmad bin
> 	   Hanbal, ^Amr bin ^Aliyy al-Qallans and their students such
> 	   as Abi Zur^ah ad-Dimashqiyy, Abi Hatim, Al-Bukhariyy, Muslim,
> 	   al-Jawzajaniyy, an-Nisa'iyy, at-Tirmithiyy, ad-Daraqutiniyy,
> 	   al-Hakim, al-Bayhaqiyy and others.
> 
> 	   Also the sholars used the sunnah to deduce judgments form it.
> 	   They referred to the authentic ahadith and accurate narrations.
> 	   They knew what they were doing. They did not give judgments
> 	   without knowledge. The interpretations of the hadith was 
> 	   documented like the interpretation of al-Qur'an. One may use
> 	   the meaning of the hadith following the meaning conveyed by
> 	   the companions who narrated these ahadith in the first place.
> 	   This is the Islamic knowledge, friends. Highly disciplined.
> 	   This is the documentation which I talked about previously.

Yet there are scholars who differ radically about those deductions.
You claim that ijma' (consensus) is also infallable yet when presented
with various Islamic schools deductions about abortion, at least two of which
were directly contradictory within the period of the first 120 days of
after conception, you chose not to explain how both ijma' were infallable.
 
> 	6. Hence, before one utters words about the hadith and the
> 	   prophet let him think about his/her rank. Before one jumps
> 	   into conclusions let him see what was said about the hadith.

According to your past actions if one doesn't like what a hadith says one
can safely ignore it. Please extend your right to others.
 
> 	5. Fear Allah and don't give judgements without knowledge.
> 	   Know that you are going to be asked in the Day of Judgement
> 	   about what you say (50:18).

See 5:101-102.
 
> 	This hadith of the heart is sahih and it will stay like that, despite
> 	the dust that some people may raise.

Since the Prophet (saws), by direct evidence of the Qur'an, was
fallable, and I have provided you evidence that the ijma' can be
fallable, can any human claim to be infallable, therefore better than
the Prophet (saws)?  The Prophet (saws) had the privilege to be
corrected by Allah. Unless you claim to have direct contact with Allah
and can be corrected by him, you will also need correction at one time
or another.