By Babatunde Jose
After the death of the Prophet and the passing of the first generation of his aides, Muslims were at a loss as to what the Prophet would have done under varying hypothetical situations. The lot then fell on the jurists to start collecting Hadiths (Reports) which recorded the Prophet’s words on a given occasion and his habitual mode of behavior (Sunnah).
The Hadith became crucial to the body of Islamic law extracted from detailed Islamic sources. Some of these ‘reports’ were used to support the new forms of Islamic piety that had developed; others provided historical evidence to support state policy.
These reports multiplied during the eighth and ninth centuries, until a bewildering number of Hadith circulated throughout the empire, covering everyday matters, metaphysics, cosmology, cosmogony and theology as well as politics.
These were finally collected and anthologized. The most famous editors were Muhammad ibn Ismail al-Bukhari (d. 870) and Muslim ibn al-Hajjaj (d. 875). Because some Hadith include questionable and even contradictory statements, the authentication of hadith became a major field of study in Islam.
The Hadith were vigorously promoted by a populist contingent known as the Ahl al-Hadith (‘Hadith People’) who insisted that Muslim law be rooted in these eyewitness reports instead of the ‘independent reasoning’ (ijtihad) developed by the jurists. Their piety appalled the more rationally inclined Muslims, since it threatened their strict sense of divine unity, but these practices also resembled the way Christians had come to think about Jesus. Through the Hadith, Muhammad had gained divination and reverence.
Hadith have been called “the backbone” of Islamic civilization, and within that religion the authority of Hadith as a source for religious law and moral guidance ranks second only to that of the Quran. Scriptural authority for Hadith comes from the Quran which enjoins Muslims to emulate Muhammad and obey his judgments (in verses such as 24:54, 33:21).
While the number of verses pertaining to law in the Quran is relatively few, Hadith give direction on everything from details of religious obligations such as ablutions for prayer, number of Rakats to the correct forms of salutations. Thus the “great bulk” of the rules of Sharia (Islamic law) are derived from Hadith, rather than the Quran.
Early in Islamic history there was a school of thought that adhered to the view that the Hadith were incompatible with Islam. For 300 years following the Prophet’s death, there remained a portion of Muslims who “mocked and derided” the system of Hadith.
There are many Muslims (some of whom call themselves Quranists but many are also known as Submitters) who believe that most Hadiths are actually fabrications created in the 8th & 9th century AD, and which are falsely attributed to the Prophet.
It should be noted that the corpus of Hadith is an amorphous body of information with a mass of contradictions, sometimes embarrassment not only to Muslims but a source of discomfiture to Islam.
Some Hadith have given ammunition to enemies of Islam and have often been used to cast aspersion on the Prophet. The obnoxious satirical book of Salman Rushdie, The Satanic Verses is a good example and the vilification of the Prophet as a pedophile is an abuse that won’t go away because the Hadith erroneously lend credence to such charges.
There are other such embarrassing issues such as stories of the prophet going through all his wives in one night; the prophet condemning the use of the left hand saying it is associated with the Devil: Yet Allah in His wisdom created the left handed child. Some Hadiths have even gone as far as creating unsavory impression of Islam as a violent religion.
According to the Quran, there is no intercession at all on Judgment Day. ‘Kosi gbami gbami ni ojo Qiyyama’. This assertion is repeated three times in Quran 2:48: Then guard yourselves against a day when one soul shall not avail another nor shall intercession be accepted for her, nor shall compensation be taken from her, nor shall anyone be helped (from outside); Also 2:123 and 254).
Hadith is at odds with the Quran in terms of religious philosophy, this time in terms of the personal nature of salvation as some Hadith claim that the Prophet will intercede on behalf of his people on the Day of Judgment.
There is also a problem with ritual prayer (salat). While hadith literature speaks of things which “nullify” the prayer as if it were a product to be inspected, the Quran focuses on internalizing the reading so that it prevents us from injustices and evil acts (29:45). Prayer is not about form but rather substance.
Yes, even in matters of the concept of reward and sin: Most Muslims believe that Islam is just about seeking rewards and the rewards are like ‘points’ to enter Jannah. However, in the Quran no verses support such understanding. Today, the way most Muslims comprehend Islam is to seek for reward rather than the approval of Allah.
By the year 200 A.H. a total of 600,000 Hadiths were in existence, out of which 408,324 were fabricated by 620 forgers. Most notorious forger Ibn Au’jaa confessed before he was hanged that he alone had forged 4,000 Hadiths.
It has been suggested that three major sources of corruption of Hadith are political conflicts, sectarian prejudice and the desire to translate the underlying meaning, rather than the verbatim words, of the original quotes.
An important tradition that bear relevance to our mode of worship relates to the place of women in Islamic prayer.
The custom of purdah in certain Muslim countries raises the question as to whether women may go to the mosques. Yet, there was no such question in the time of the Prophet when women freely took part in religious services. See Bukhari 9:22 and 10:65; 152.
All the above traditions afford overwhelming evidence of the fact that women, just in the same way as men, used to frequent the mosques without let or hindrance. The Prophet was quoted as saying: Do not prohibit the handmaidens of Allah from going to the Mosques of Allah. Bukhari 11:12
The practice of women present in the mosques seems to have continued long after the Prophet’s time. Within the mosque they are not separated by a screen or curtain. They only form a line behind the men, see Bukhari 10:164. And though they were covered by an over-garment, they did not wear a veil. On the great gathering of the Hajj a woman was expressly forbidden to wear a veil, see Bukhari 25:23.
In the year 256 A.H. The Governor of Mecca is said to have tied ropes between the columns in the mosque to make a separate place for women. See the Encyclopedia of Islam. By the end of the day, the separation grew to the point that women were barred from the mosque entirely. Something that never happened during the time of the founder of the religion.
The roots of gender segregation in Islam have been investigated by many historians. Leila Ahmed explained that the harem arose in the Umayyad and Abbasid dynasties. It was not an institution from the time and place of Prophet Muhammad. Leor Halevi wrote in an article about women and mourning laments that a ″novel and unprecedented concern with the segregation of the sexes″ took place in Kufa, Iraq, in the eighth century. In time, this became normative.
Still under prayers are the concept of Tahajud prayer and Tarawih. Why we do not find the word “Tarawih” anywhere in the original Islamic documents (i.e, the Quran and Sunnah)? The prayer is referred to as the “Night Prayer” (Qiam-ul-layl) in the Quran and Sunnah, which basically is the Tahajud prayer.
The name Tarawih was invented by the followers when the Prophet offered the prayer in public for few nights. He did not intend to make it a formal prayer and did not invite people to join him. It was the curious group of followers who stood behind him and followed him in that Tahajud prayer. When the Prophet realized the matter he stopped offering the prayer publicly.
The Tahajud prayer is voluntary night prayer after the Isha prayer, presumably after some sleep, late at night. It was enjoined on the Prophet. See Quran 73:1-6; 73:20; 17:19. He later asked his people to perform it in their homes. While the recitation from the Quran in ordinary prayers are short, those during Tahajud could be long. Initially it consisted of 8 Rakats with an additional three of Witr.
No doubt, after the Prophet, the Witr prayer was taken from Tahajud and added to the Isha prayer. Owing to the Prophet’s emphasis on the Tahajud during the Ramadan, the Companions became very particular about it and it was later transform into the Tarawih which we now practice during Ramadan. Though the Tahajud is still practiced as a private late-night prayer.
It was Umar during his Caliphate that introduced a change whereby the Tahajud became a congregational prayer after the Isha during Ramadan. It is now the practice to recite the whole Quran in the Tarawih prayers during Ramadan. Umar at first ordered eleven Rakats but later increased to 20 in addition to three Witr making 23 Rakats. This practice is maintained throughout the Muslim world, the Ahl Hadith and the Ahmadis being almost the only exception. Who says all Bidah is a sin?
However, there is no doubt the Hadith are too voluminous and there are many repetitions and contradictions in them. The Hadith tried to cover every facet of life of the prophet including his very private ones such as his sex life.
As the curtain falls on the Holy month of Ramadan this weekend, we thank God for seeing us through the month and pray that we witness many more, in good health. We pray for the repose of the souls of those who started but did not finish the fast with us and pray that Allah grant them Jannatul Firdous. To the rest of us, we say Alhamdulillah for a successful Ramadan. May Allah’s peace and blessings be with us. Ameen.
Barka Juma’at, Ramadan Kareem and Happy Eid El-Fitr.
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