The Limits of the Hadith Sciences and the Heart of the Quran

“Every field of knowledge has its limitations, just as the Messenger (saw) was eager to ensure that we knew that even the religion has its limits”. 

The remit of a Scholar of Hadith is that they know the isnad, the chain of transmission from one generation to the next, and can critically appraise it. 

Often since their remit is not to examine the internal consistency of Hadith, nor it’s external consistency, nor look past its isnad, they do not do so. 

And in not doing so they miss much. 

It would be beneficial to look at a specific example to bring this point home to you. 

For some of them say that the Hadith, in which the Messenger (saw) calls Surah Ya Sin the heart of the Quran, is weak. And yet it is culturally significant in that many of us have taken that Hadith to heart. 

Some even go so far as to say it is fabricated. 

But they do so by only examining it’s isnad. 

The chain of narration could have be broken with a missing link, or even one such individual that they considered untrustworthy, could have this one time narrated it correctly, and it could be a true saying of the Messenger (saw). 

Except one that is not verifiably true by the exacting standards of the Hadith Sciences. *3

Furthermore it’s not like the narration is critical to our understanding of the religion.  

And so let’s look at this particular Hadith a little more carefully, and a little more in depth. 

Either the Messenger (saw) was referring to the position of YaSin within the Quran or he was referring to its standing within the Quran.  

Yasin does not sit half way in our Qurans. 

And so it must refer to its standing with respect to the Quran, and the effect it has on it’s people.

Figuratively the heart moves us to action and enervates us. When we say something is the heart, we emphasise it’s desirability. 

Now read Yasin keeping that meaning in mind, and see if you can decipher the class of people it is meant to move to action. 

Here you will need a rudimentary understanding of the Seerah, of the classes people to whom the Messenger (saw) was sent. (*1)

Now imagine that you are one of those class of people, and read it as if it were talking directly to you. Does it not move you?

And would it not move you to incredible feats of endurance and sacrifice?

Not because the argument appeals to your intellect. But because it appeals fully to your heart. *2

And that it did indeed move that class of people to an incredible and unprecedented action, that forever changed the course of the World’s collective history, cannot be doubted. 

So that when we look at it now we do not need to know that it’s isnad is not intact. 

It’s truth is self evident. 

It’s interesting to note that many scholars of hadeeth narration, notable amongst them an-Nawawi, collected forty hadeeth. 

They did this in accordance with another saying of the Messenger (saw) in which he said that one who transmits forty Hadith from him would attain the class of one who understands the religion. 

Now take your time to contemplate that. 

There are two beautiful gems that can be gleaned from that saying. 

First we know that Allah t’ala is One and loves the odd (another well known Hadith). And that very often in our corpus of knowledge seven, seventy and seven hundred are numbers that are equated with the symbolism of a great many or a great quantity. 

But here in this one transmission that lauds transmission itself, the Messenger (saw) stops short of seventy. 

It is as if he is telling us that it’s not the quantity of Hadith that you learn and then transmit, but it is the quality of understanding, that really matters. 

And then this truth is brought home by the next line. That one who does so attains the  level of one who understands the religion. 

And that therefore the one that understands the religion is at a higher level than the one that transmits.  

A truth that the Messenger (saw) hinted at the farewell pilgrimage in front of many thousands - those that are here tell those that absent, perchance they may be the ones that better understand. 

The mother of Islamic Sciences is Tafsir ul Quran, and deliberating on that alongside the Seerah of the Messenger (saw) - per chance Allah t’ala might bless you, and us all, with understanding. 

Knowledge is sought through study and contemplation. Not through lectures nor talks, nor this above.