Hadrth Criticism

1848 Gustav Weil, after noting that al-Bukhari deemed only 4,000 of his original 600,000 hadith» to be authentic, suggests that a European critic is further required to reject without hesitation at least half of these 4,000.10 He was soon followed by Aloys Sprenger, who also suggests that many of the lJadiths cannot be considered authentic.'! However, that there is a debate about the authenticity of lJadith material in the West is largely due to the innovative theories of Ignaz Goldziher. The subsequent direction this debate has taken, a direction which has focussed on the role of hadtth» in the origin and development of early Muslim jurisprudence, is largely due to the work of Joseph Schacht.

I. Goldziher and the Advocacy of Scepticism

While others had expressed some doubt about the authenticity of haduhs. before Goldziher.U it was he who in the second volume of his Muhammedanische Studien first clearly articulated this scepticism. Familiarity with the vast number of haduhs in the canonical collections induced "sceptical caution rather than optimistic trust. "13 Goldziher concluded that these lJadzths could "not serve as a document for the history of the infancy of Islam, but [served] rather as a reflection of the tendencies which appeared in the community during the maturer stages of its development. "14

Coldziher's suspicions about the authenticity of haduhs sprang from several observations. The material found in later collections makes no references to earlier written collections and uses terms in the isnads which imply oral transmission, not written sources.l'' Moreover, the ubiquitous contradictory traditions, the apparent proliferation of hadiths in later collections not attested to in earlier ones, and the fact that younger Companions of Muhammad seem to have known more about him (that is, they transmitted more lJadfths) than the older Companions who presumably knew the Prophet for a greater length of time, suggested to Goldizher that large-scale fabrication of lJadfths took place.

As a result, Goldziher provides a significantly different version of the origin and development of lJadith literature. Goldziher has no trouble accepting that the Companions preserved the words and deeds of their prophet after his death, and that these might have been recorded in written form in ~alJ,ifas. In this way he remains very close to the Muslim interpretation of the development of hadtth. literature. He not only presumes that the Companions tried to preserve the sayings and judgments of Muhammad, but also that some of them likely did so in written form (that is, in $alj,ifas). And, when these Companions passed on what they had heard and recorded to the next generation of Muslims, the WI(' of the isnnd began. u. But for Goldziher, the invention of and iutcrpolation into ~uullllr~ also hC·Kan very early. for hoth polilicalJ7 and

Thr J),'TI~I(1nnent of Exegesis in Early Islam

Hadtth Criticism

1"'1,1'--111'11. III IC,I,'''"S_ And so mutually exclusive hadiths proliferated; "it is 11 .. 1 ""I'II'~IIlK Ilml, among the hotly debated controversial issues of Islam, \\ I .. 111'"1 I".hlll ,II or doctrinal, there is not one in which the champions of Ih.-- \".111111" "!I'WS arf" unable to cite a number of traditions, all equipped WII II 11111" '~'"K 1I1UldJ, "19

Willi IIII' ri_~c of the 'Abbasids the situation changed significantly, ,1 •• tI"hllJ.: 10 (;oldl.iher. 'Abbasid rule was more theocratic than the more ~ ... Id.1I "Arab paganism" of the Umayyads.s? Consequently, the new rly ... I\ly l'll( ouraged the development of the sharr'a and even employed 1111111 I h('olo~ians to advise the caliphs, some of whom themselves studied .111(1 )Iarli<ipaled in theological debates, This attempt to give public life a 1111)'" n:ligiolls character also involved giving official recognition to the SIIIIII,L The rise of the surma had begun during the Umayyad period in pall ill opposition to the perceived wickedness of the time, but its slIpporters remained relatively ineffective until the advent of the 'Abbasid revolution, The report that the Umayyad caliph cUmar II commissioned the first collection of haduh» must be dismissed as untrustworthy because of the number of contradictions in the account and the absence of references to Abu Bakr ibn Hazm's work in later literature, For Goldziher, I his claim is hagiographic, that is, "nothing but an expression of the good opinion that people had of the pious caliph and his love for the sunna,"21

Goldziher maintains that, while reliance on the surma to regulate the empire was favoured, there was still in these early years of Islam insufficient material going back to Muhammad himself, Scholars sought 10 fill the gaps left by the Qur"an and the sunna with material from other sources. Some borrowed from Roman law, Others attempted to fill these lacunae with their own opinions (raJy). This latter option came under a concerted attack by those who believed that all legal and ethical questions (not addressed by the Qur"an) must be referred back to the Prophet himself, that is, must be rooted in hadiths. These supporters of haduhs (ahl af-I}adilh) were extremely successful in establishing hadiths as a primary source of law and in discrediting raJy. But in many ways it was a Pyrrhic victory. The various legal madhhabs were loath to sacrifice their doctrines and so they found it more expedient to fabricate haduhs or adapt existing luuliths in their support. Even the advocates of raJy were eventually persuaded or cajoled into accepting the authority of haduh« and so they 100 "found" lJadiths which substantiated their doctrines that had hitherto been based upon the opinions of their schools' founders and teachers.V The insistence of the advocates of hadiths that the only opinions of any valu« were those which could appeal to the authority of the Prophet rc'sltllc~d ill rhe situation that "where no traditional matter was to be had, 111('11 spc'('dily IIcKali 10 fahricllt: it. The greater the demand, the huxir-r W;I~ iuvrnrion with th« IlIaIlIlLI("IIII(' of aponYl'itallradiliolis ill _"111'1'".1 III II u- 1 nl'l'l'l iw' t hl'sl's ... ~;~ Th« {11/lIh jou ... lI'ys ~hich tolloWC"ll, rI III III f', will. hI hr-

travellers sought to collect haduh» from the various centres of the Islamic empire, helped construct a more uniform corpus of extant hadith» out of the various disparate local collections.

Eventually, however there were reactions to this widespread fabrication of haduh». Goldziher traces three such reactions to this phenomenon, Ironically, fabricated hadiths began to circulate in which Muhammad is made to condemn those who would fabricate lJaduhs about him. Others simply rejected the whole corpus of haduhs and referred only to the Qur"an, The third reaction was the one which arose among the traditionalists themselves and came eventually to dominate. They developed a means by which to evaluate the authenticity of any haduh. This method focussed not on the actual contents of the lJadUh (matn) but on the transmitters of the main, that is, on the isnad. Goldziher seems to suggest that this critique was in nascent form already around 150 A.H. Even with this type of examination, forgeries continued to be made through the manipulation of the isnad in somewhat more subtle ways, According to Goldziher, hadiths, which originally had isnads ending with Companions or Successors, were often extended back to the Prophet. That is ahaduh. mawqilfa were transformed into ahadtth. marfuca by tacking on the Prophet and any other necessary names to the end of the isnad. Isnads were also "tampered" with by the muiammarin - the long-lived ones, For Goldziher these were persons who pretended to have had direct contact with Muhammad even though this might mean that they would have to be well over a hundred years old (and at times hundreds of years 01d),24

As stated earlier, Goldziher questions the traditional date at which the formal collection of hadiths began, It was not in the time of cUmar II, but with the Muuaua" of Malik ibn Anas (d. 179/795). that the process

. started,25 That is, Goldziher believes hadith. gathering began only towards the end of the second century A.H, (late eighth or early ninth C.E,) with fiqh works being the precursors to proper lJadith works,26 These latter works came soon after, as a more a systematic arrangement of the haduh. material became necessary. As the insistence that legal and religious practice be rooted in hadiths. had grown, so too had the available material. This arrangement took two forms: the musnad (arranged according to the isnads) and the musannaj (arranged according to topic). The mu~annafs came to predominate, but the musnads continued to be compiled.f? An example of a musnad is the compilation of Ahmad ibn Hanbal. The first musannaf that gained prevalence was the compilation of al-Bukhari. It, unlike the Muuuuta', is a work of hadiths. with al-Bukhari's contribution heing one of selection and arrangement, After the compilation of the six canonical collections in the middle of the third century A.H. (second half of rhe ninth cen nuv C.E.). Goldziher feels, there was a decline in haduh. liu-r.uurr' ill II ... S("IlSI' rh.u, instead of heing compilers of new material,

The Delleialnrllml of' /·;:UW·.\'I In F(/'rl,~ lslum.

Hadith Criticism

J. Schacht and Fictitious Legall:ladiths

Studies, as the foundation or at least a point of departure for almost all other studies on hadiths in the West,35

In Origins Schacht's main concern is the origin of Islamic law, the shart'a, and particularly the role of al-Shaficr in its development. This traditionist and legal theorist is thought to be responsible for championing the sunna - sunna specifically understood as the model behaviour of Muhammad as opposed to the 'living tradition' of the Muslim community which might or might not claim to have such a direct connection to Muhammad.P'' In so doing, Schacht discusses the process of development of haduh. material (and hence its authenticity and chronology).

Schacht asserts that hadith«, particularly from Muhammad, did not form, together with the Qur"an, the original bases of Islamic law and jurisprudence as is traditionally assumed. Rather, haduhs were an innovation begun after some of the legal foundation had already been built. 'The ancient schools of law shared the old concept of sunna or 'living tradition' as the ideal practice of the community, expressed in the accepted doctrine of the school. "37 And this ideal practice was embodied in various forms, but certainly not exclusively in the I}adtths from the Prophet. Schacht argues that it was not until al-Shafft that 'surma' was exclusively identified with the contents of I}adfths from the Prophet to which he gave, not for the first time, but for the first time consistently, overriding authority. Al-Shafi"I argued that even a single, isolated haduli going back to Muhammad, assuming its isnad is not suspect, takes precedence over the opinions and arguments of any and all Companions, Successors, and later authorities. Schacht notes that:

Two generations before Shafici reference to traditions from Companions and Successors was the rule, to traditions from the Prophet himself the exception, and it was left to Shafici to make the exception the principle. We shall have to conclude that, generally and broadly speaking, traditions from Companions and Successors are earlier than those from the Prophet.P

Based on these conclusions, Schacht offers the following schema of the growth of legal hadiths. The ancient schools of law had a 'living tradition (sunna) which was largely based on individual reasoning (raJy). Later th is surma came to be associated with and attributed to the earlier generatiolls of the Successors and Companions. Later still, hadiths with isntids extending back to Muhammad came into circulation by traditionists towards the middle of the second century. Finally, the efforts of al-Shafi) and other traditionists secured for these hadiths from the Prophet supreme authority.39 However, the development of prophetic tradition did not, ccasr- ;It this point. In fact, as a result of the new authority conferred "POll 11(('111, Schacht suggests that a large JlIIIJlh(;r of rlu: hrulrth» pn's('1 v('d ill II u: I 1.1~'Ii, ;,1 r-ollcrtions oriKill"'('d 1I0tll dllrill~ awl ;11'1,'1

haduh. scholars became copyists and editors prodllcing mukhtasars, or "abridged versions."

In summary, Goldziher sees in hadiths "a bank-field of the political and dynastic conflicts of the first few centuries of Islam: it is a mirror of the aspirations of various parties, each of which wants to make the Prophet himself their witness and authority. "28 Likewise,

Every stream and counter-stream of thought in Islam has found its expression in the form of a hadith, and there is no difference in this respect between the various contrasting opinions ill whatever field. What we learnt about political parties holds true too for differences regarding religious law, dogmatic points of difference etc. Every raJy or hawa, every sunna and mdca has sought and found expression in the form of ~adrth.29

And even though Muslim traditionalists developed elaborate means to scrutinize the mass of traditions that were then extant in the Muslim lands, they were "able to exclude only part of the most obvious falsifications from the hadlth material. "30 Goldziher, for all his scepticism, accepted that the practice of preserving haduhs was authentic and that some lJadzths were likely to be authentic.U However, having said that, Goldziher is adamant in maintaining that:

In the absence of authentic evidence it would indeed be rash to attempt to express the most tentative opinions as to which parts of the hadith are the oldest material, or even as to which of them date back to the generation immediately following the Prophet'S death, Closer acquaintance with the vast stock of hadiths induces sceptical caution rather than optimistic trust regarding the material brought together in the carefully compiled collections.V

And so it is in his advocacy of scepticism that Goldziher made his great impact on the course of haduh. studies in the West. 33

Goldziher never went much beyond this simple scepticism about the authenticity of the bulk of the haduh. material to advance a more practical theory for determining the chronology and provenance of any specific lJadfth. He limited his dating of hadiths to the general comments like "maturer stages of its development" or "first few centuries of Islam". Although he hesitated to date the traditions, the scholars who continued his work expended considerable effort in that very endeavour.

Of the next: generation of scholars, Joseph Schacht most prominently carried Oil Cold/.iher's tradition of sccplicism~4 and his (),Ji!1,11 0/ Muhrnnnuulan .I",ri.l/nlull,tlo· in IIII'll serve's, "lunK' silk (;old/ilwl'~ 1\1,111,,1,

The Development of Exegesis in Early Islam

Hadith Criticism

al-Shaf{i's time. That is, most Prophetic lJ,adfths in the collections of Bukhari, Muslim, and the others originated, not with Muhammad, but circa the middle of the second century AH., while IJ,adzths citing the opinions of Companions and other authorities originated somewhat earlier. In one of his most emphatic statements, Schacht concludes that " ... every legal tradition from the Prophet, until the contrary is proved, must be .taken not as an authentic or essentially authentic, even if slightly obscured, statement valid for his time or of the time of the Companions, but is the fictitious expression of a legal doctrine formulated at a later date. "40 Schacht therefore dismisses Muslim scholarship on lJ,adUhs, which itself is based on the study and criticism of isnilds as "irrelevant for the purpose of historical analysis. "41

Although Schacht offers a far more refined argument than Goldziher, he has not yet gone far beyond him in his theories. This Schacht does, however, in the methods for determining the provenance of specific IJ,adfths which he develops. His unique contribution lies in his alternative to the "irrelevant" methods of Muslims; he suggests that the date of a lJ,adfth can be ascertained from its first appearance in the legal discussion, from its relative position in the history of the problem with which it is concerned, and from certain indications in the text and the isnad.

What is meant by 'its first appearance in the legal discussion' is obvious.

If a particular ~adfth is adduced in one text but is not to be found in an earlier text in which that same ~adfth would have been of crucial importance, then it is safe to assume that the haduh. was not yet extant and was invented sometime after the writing of the earlier one. This is essentially an argument from silence, but quite a compelling one.

By 'its relative position in the history of the problem' Schacht means to suggest that hadiths were frequently fabricated in a polemical context. That is to say, they were designed specifically to refute certain pre-existing doctrines or practices. A new hadub or set of lJ,adfths would then provoke the supporters or practitioners of the attacked doctrine or practice to manufacture ~adiths to both defend it and to undermine the refuting lJadfths. Their opponents would then respond with more and usually more elaborate hadiths. Thus, by juxtaposing various parallel or related ~ad'iths and comparing their matns, one may be able to reconstruct the chronology of the ~adfths surrounding a particular controversy. The doctrine or practice being attacked is, of course, chronologically prior to the ~ad'ith countering it. A ~adfth defending the practice or doctrine is likely to be after the counter-~adUh.42

'Indications in the text' means looking at the authority cited in a hadith.

In the course of polemical discussions. each group was forced to project its doctrine to increasingly higher authorities. That is. teachings once ascribed to Successors become those of Companions. and the lalll'! III 1111'11 become tilt: words of' the Prophet himself. Schaclu "'Wlt'!! 111"1:

Whenever we find, as frequently happens, alleged opinions of Successors, alleged decisions of the Companions. and alleged traditions from the Prophet side by side, we must, as a rule and until the contrary is proved, consider the opinions of the Successors as the starting point, and the traditions from the Companions and .from the Prophet as secondary developments, intended to provide higher authority for the doctrine in question.P

Closely related to these textual indications are the 'indications in the isnild,' by which Schacht means his the backward growth of isnads. This theory is summed up in his famous dictum: "The more perfect the isnad, the later the tradition.T'" Thus, Schacht sees the isnads as the most arbitrary part of the ~adfths, but because their fabrication and development follows certain patterns, they nevertheless allow the ~adfths to be dated in many cases.

As the depth of the isnilds grew (that is, backward growth), so too did their breadth grow. This 'spread of isnilds' occurred because additional isnads were created to support a particular lJadfth and in this way obviated the charge that the IJ,adflh was 'isolated.' Thus 1n'fltawatir ~adfths have no more claim to authenticity than do other lJ,adfths. Schacht argues that:

Any typical representative of the group whose doctrine was to be projected back on to an ancient authority, could be chosen at random and put into the isnild. We find therefore an number of alternative names in otherwise identical isnnds, where other considerations exclude the possibility of the transmission of a genuine old doctrine by several persons.P

Because of the arbitrariness of this isnild manufacture, Schacht feels that it would be pointless to attempt to reconstruct the opinions and doctrinal positions of the Companions. "[T]hey are the products of schools of thought which put their doctrines under the authority of the Companions. "46 He also dismisses the claim to genuineness of the lJ,adiths with family isnads (that is, those that were transmitted exclusively within several generations of one family). For Schacht "the existence of a family isnad [is] not an indication of authenticity but only a device for securing its appearance.l"?

Schacht observed another phenomenon that he feels can be employed in determining the provenance of report. He notes that in many cases, the isnilds of haduhs with similar or related contents often contain the same transmitter somewhere in the middle of the isnad. Schacht's own example (see Diagram 1) of this phenomenon shows 'Amr ibn Abi 'Amr as the common link or common transmitter for three instances of the same main. For Schacht, I,hill is a case where a report has been put into circulation hya 1,,"lIliollllll or hy someone IIsill)ot hi!! name. A s the n:porl

II'II

The Development of Exegesis in Early Islam

Hadith Criticism

Diagram 1

Prophet

I

jabir

I

Prophet

I

jabir

I

Muttalib

Prophet

I

jabir

I

Muttalib

E. Stetter and Topoi and Schemata in Hadiths

In his 1965 dissertation Eckart Stetter examines the topoi and schemata in I],adfths using a representative segment from Bukhari's $al}.zl}.. By a topos, Stetter means a narrative cliche which provides circumstantial details, such as the exact place and/or time Muhammad is to have said or done something, that imply intimate, personal contact. For example, hadiths: often mention that the first transmitter heard Muhammad while he was speaking from the minbar or describe what he was wearing. These typified situations and stereotypical figures of speech are superfluous comments, found almost exclusively at the beginning of the matn. These topoi do not just exist to facilitate the flow of the narrative; rather, the motivation behind them was to provide "authentic" detail.52

The schemata are also narrative forms that serve to fill lacunae and to connect, associate and organize materials. These forms include the repetition (often in threes) of phrases, the use of parallelism (both of form and content), the use of assonance and rhyme, and so forth. This schematization may also serve a mnemonic purpose, useful, no doubt, in oral transmission.P

Stetter credits unknown redactors (unknown both individually and collectively) with the influx of these topoi and schemata into preliterary materials. Whether such elements could have entered the preliterary material as oral formulae used by storytellers is a possibility left unaddressed by Stetter. The touches of authenticity, such as circumstantial details about Muhammad, would certainly be necessary for any fabricator of I}.aduhs, and the ready-made topoi and schemata would provide them in both the content and form of the matns. Stetter does not draw on the works of Goldziher or Schacht directly, and in that sense his thesis stands somewhat apart from the authenticity debate. Nevertheless his observations about the presence of these narrative motifs certainly raise questions about the authenticity or, at the very least, the reliability of the hadith. literature in a manner independent of, though not uncongenial to, the doubts raised by Goldziher and Schacht.P?

Goldziher introduced scepticism about lJadiths. Schacht and Stetter suggest plausible mechanisms for the creation of false haduhs, Because this scepticism strikes at the very foundation of early Islamic literature, the rest of the edifice begins to crumble. The very piece of evidence that is meant to guarantee genuineness of the matn, the isnad, is being summarily dismissed as a fabrication. Therefore, to non-sceptics the conclusions of Goldziher and Schacht are wrong because they are based on a misunderstanding of the transmission system. In other words, their (false) assumptions about the nature of haduhs has led then to (false) rondllsio!ls. And so. their arguments seem contrived. circular, anrl C'unll'ary 10 r(""~"11 t" thus,' who disay;r('t; with Ih(,lII .

man of the Banu Salama

CAmr ibn Abi "Arnr

,II

I

CAbd al-cAziz ibn Muhammad

Ibrahim

ibn Muhammad

Sulayman ibn Bila)

anonymous

I

Shaficr48

I I

was passed on to others, represented in the diagram by the names below 'Amr's, the "real part of the isnad' would branch out into several strands. The isnad would not terminate with the one who put the main in circulation, for he would have fabricated an isniid reaching back to an authority such as a Companion or the Prophet. This is represented in the diagram by the names above 'Arnr's and is for Schacht the "fictitious part of the isnad:" It would often acquire additional branches to improve its authority. The existence of this common link, Schacht suggests, would be a strong indication in favour of its having originated in or after the time of the aforementioned traditionist, in this case 'Arnr's, and so fix a terminus a quo for the appearance of the QadHh.49

Schacht's examination of the development of isnads is also premised on his hypothesis that legal lJadiths go back only as far as 100 AH., that is, in the last years of the Umayyad rule - when, according to him, Islamic legal thought began.P" This concurs with the statement, attributed to Ibn Sirin, that interest in isnads began from the time of the fitna (strife) after which people could not be trusted to give non-partisan reports. For Schacht, the fitna began with the murder of the Caliph Walid ibn Yazid (d. 126/744). Schacht points out that Ibn Sirin died in 110 A.H. (728 C.E.), so the tradition is ohviously spurious, hut nevertheless accepts the dating illlpli"d because II(; sees IlO evickllo' of the r('glilar lise of isruul» 1" i", ,,, 100 A.II.'d

... '

1'11111

The Development of Exegesis in Early Islam

Hadlth Criticism

indeed significantly undermined many of Schacht's conclusions. Certainly many of the examples adduced by Schacht were done so incorrectly or inappropriately. Yet, the dismissal of a few examples does not necessarily weaken the overarching patterns suggested by Schacht, especially since many of Azami's conclusions, like those of Abbott and Sezgin, rest on complete faith in the historicity of the source material.

This faith, of course, is the problem for sceptics. The arguments of Abbott, Sezgin, and Azami rely on biographical materials that were produced symbiotically with the isniids they seek to defend. These sources are not independent. And so their arguments seem no less contrived, circular, and contrary to reason as those of the sceptics seem to their opponents. As a result, we are left with two seemingly diametrically opposed theories for the origin and development of lJadlths and, hence, of early Islam itself.

Something which always struck me in the work of Sezgin, Azmi and also in that of Abbott ... is that they do not seem to realize that, even if a manuscript or a papyrus is unearthed with an allegedly ancient text, this text could easily have been forged by an authority who lived at a time later than the supposedly oldest authority given in its isnad. Isnnd fabrication occurred ... on just as vast a scale as matn fabrication.F

THE SEARCH FOR MIDDLE GROUND

From the above it may seem that Juynboll is hardly seeking "middle ground. " However, he believes that the early reports regarding the origins of lJadfth material, while obviously not all true, do, when taken as a whole, converge on a fairly reliable and historically accurate description. He adds, "I think that a generous lacing of open-mindedness, which dour sceptics might describe as naivete, is an asset in the historian of early Islamic society rather than a shortcoming to be overcome and suppressed at all costs."93 In addition to this qualified credulity of his, Juynboll finds middle ground in many of his conclusions about the origins and authenticity of the hadith. material and sciences, which he largely bases on the awii'il literature - anecdotes about who was the first to do something or when and where certain institutions were first established.l"

According to the awii'il sources, after Muhammad's death the first to spread stories about him (in a deliberate manner) were the storytellers (qu.Hi4), who told stories of an edifying nature. Isniirls proper were not attached to these "prophetic" utterances. It is reported that Sha'ibt (d. 103-10/721-8) was the first person to question someone about an authority and that Shu'iba ibn al-Hajjaj (d. 160/777) was the first to examine every isnad. And so, systematic rijiil criticism began about 130/ 747. Hence, isniids did not appear as early as many Muslim scholars believe. For Juynboll, the jitna to which Ibn Sirin alluded was the war between the Umayyads and Zubayrids.f" This scenario, which places the origin of the isnadaround the year 70/690 (as opposed to 35/656), makes the awii:il account of the first isniid critics much more plausible.

Juynboll outlines his tentative chronology of the growth of lJ,adiths in the following manner. He does not dispute that Muslims began to record things about their prophet during his lifetime, but there is nothing to suggest that this was practised on a significant scale. His examination of the awii"il evidence on the introduction of haduhs to various parts of the Islamic world and on the collection of such material indicates a relatively late growth. He suggests that "the earliest origins of standardized hadflh[s] cannot be traced back earlier than, at most, to the seventies or eighties of the first century. What had preceded this was ... still unstructured and still unstandardizcd material of edifying content'> ... or with a political slant. .. "_!In .I "y" holl further supports this conclusion through an exam inanon of tlu- lilllilf'd liN!' of ~lflflfths in the initial Y"al's ann MIII:l,lIlIlI1ad's

Many scholars have found merit in the arguments and theories of Goldziher and Schacht, and in those of Abbott, Sezgin, and Azami. While the scepticism of the former two seems largely justified, these other scholars are loath to accept the full implications of the doubts raised. They are not willing to resign themselves to such uncertainty. Nor are they willing to accept what appears at times to be the seemingly naive position of the latter three. The use of simple ascription is historically untenable to them. And so these other scholars have tried to find an intermediate position between belief and unbelief in the historicity and authenticity of the hadith. literature.

G. H. A. JuynboU and the Refinement of Schacht's Methods Gautier H. A. Juynboll, like Azami, has delved deeply into the issues of origin and authenticity of the hadith. material as raised by Schacht. But unlike Azami, Juynboll embraces Schacht's work and is in many respects his successor, even though he differs from him on several significant points. That is, Juynboll defends and considerably refines Schacht's theories, but he also retreats from his complete scepticism about the authenticity of lJ,adfths.90 On the whole, he is just as distrustful of the historical value of isnads, but pushes the date for their appearance to not earlier than the end of the first century, which is several very significant decades earlier than Schacht places it.

Juynboll sees himself in the line of Goldziher and Schacht, not Abbott, Sezgin, and Azami. The former two are referred to as his predecessors and, while he castigates Schacht's tone and style, he openly acknowledges hill debt to his theories."! The lat.tcr three do not fan: all well. Jllyllholl Nlty":

Oil

II

The Deoelopmen: of Exegesis in Early Islam

Hadlth Criticism

death and the relatively late development of the concept of prophetic surma and IJ,adzth centres. Juynboll notes that the first three caliphs relied on their own judgement and rarely invoked the example of the Prophet. The concept of surma as sunna of the Prophet (only), developed toward the end of the first century, though a more vague concept of sunna that included Muhammad and his most respected Companions predates this more specific sunna. He credits cUmar II with the first organized attempt to apply the sunna of the Prophet. In the Hijaz, Egypt, Syria, and Iraq interest increased in haduhs in the last decades of the first century. During this period isnads were localized and only in the first few decades of the second century do isnads of 'mixed' origin appear.

Within this historical framework, Juynboll attempts to answer in a general way the question of where and when hadiths originated and who brought them into circulation. Because the Successor-Companion link in an isnad is the hardest to establish and because of the regional character of the first few transmitters below the Companion in the isniid, Juynboll concludes that the point of origin is likely the region where the transmitter mentioned at the Successor level resided.P? Furthermore, since some of the Companions are credited with such incredibly large numbers of IJ,adfths (many of which are obvious fabrications) and since most were dead when the use of isnads became mandatory (near the end of the first century), it is unlikely that they would be responsible for the IJ,adzth. So it is the Successor named in the isnad who is the earliest candidate for bringing a tradition into circulation, but since the first major growth of hadiths occurred several decades after the first century, the Successors to the Successors are the more likely candidates. Nor is it, Juynboll adds, necessarily the case that the Successor (or whoever first circulated a lJ,adfth) is responsible for having raised the isnad to the level of the Prophet. This may well be a later modification.

Juynboll believes that there was large-scale fabrication of matns, some clearly using the preserved memories of what Muhammad had said and done as a basis, some clearly in the quranic spirit, and many others not so. The isnnd system, born in the 70's, did not develop into a full-fledged science for another half-century. By that time it was too late to evaluate adequately the growing haduh. literature: sound isniids could be invented in their entirety, and no method had been developed for evaluating the matns. Yet,Juynboll maintains, as a whole the IJ,adfths do reflect reasonably accurately Muhammad's words and deeds:

[Ijt seems likely that at least part of the prophetic tradition listed in one or more canonical - or even non-canonical - collections deserves to be considered as a fair representation of what the prophet. of Islam did or said, or might have done or said. hilt slIn'ly it. is unlikely t.hat. we will ever find ('V('I'I a moderately SlIl'ITSSrll1 "u,thud

of proving with incontrovertible certainty the historicity of the ascription of such to the prophet but in a few isolated instances."

And so Juynboll, while seemingly as sceptical as Schacht, offers at least the possibility of genuine material being present in the canonical collections.

Having discussed the chronology and provenance of IJ,adUhs in general, Juynboll spends considerable effort refining and employing Schacht's common-link theory in order to the same for individual haduhs. In Muslim Tradition, he merely gives what Seems to be a defence of the theory against Azami's critique. He explains the non-universal nature of the commonlink phenomenon by suggesting that during the early stages of IJ,adith evolution, its frequency must have been much higher. Juynboll explains:

It is because of insertions, interpolations, deletions and simplifications in the matns that additional isniids supporting these alterations became so complex and variegated that the initial isnad or protoisnad, clearly showing up a common-link, supporting the hadith without accretions was no longer separately discernible.P?

That is, the common link of many IJ,adiths has been irrevocably obscured by the sheer number and complexity of fabricated isnads, However, in his articles, Juynboll is less tentative in his uselOO and elaborationl''! of the common-link theory.

One of Juynboll's most interesting contributions comes in his distinction between the common-link isniid, in which there is a single strand of three to five transmitters and then a branching out of the chains at the common link, and the inverted common link, in which the common link stands at the end of several chains of transmitters beginning with different eyewitnesses and continues from the common link along a single chain. Compare Diagrams 3 and 4. These two patterns correspond to those found in legal haduh» and historical IJ,adfths respectively. While Juynboll suggests that the common link of the former likely invented the single strand from himself to the Prophet or Companion, the common link of the latter did not.

The single strand from the cl [common link] down to the prophet does not represent the transmission path taken by a prophetic saying, a path which has a claim to (a measure of) historicity, but is a path invented by the cl in order to lend a certain saying more prestige by means of the first and foremost authentication device of his days: the isnad marjU~ 102

One would expect. especially for important hoduh«, that the isnads would begin to ran out after the Prophet, or perhaps the Companion, but not after four 01 ilion' generations. On the other hand,

The Development of Exegesis in Early Islam

Hadith Criticism

eyewitness

I

eyewitness

I

eyewitness

I

eyewitness

I

as a rule the (i)cl [inverted common link] did NOT invent the multiple strands down to various eyewitnesses, he did NOT invent the contents or the gist of the report, and even if it is conceded that he edited several different accounts of the same event and moulded them into one narrative, the gist of the historical event is not the product of his own imagination.l'"

It is for this reason that he feels that the authenticity of legallJadlths, which display the common-link pattern (represented in Diagram 3), are suspect, while historical lJ,adlths (or akhbiir), which display the inverted commonlink pattern (represented in Diagram 4) are to be accepted as reliable.

Another important phenomenon detected by Juynboll is the one in which a relatively late transmitter seems to have an independent isnad for a lJadUh that bypasses the common link and merges with the other isnads at the Successor or Companion level. Juynboll refers to this as "diving under the common link," because in his diagrams the Prophet appears at the bottom. (1 have inverted his diagrams for the sake of consistency). He suggests that the practice of circumventing the common links is a comparatively late phenomenon, originating towards the endo of the second century A.H. But these dives are useful for dating to: the higher the bypass above the common link, later the origin of that particular strand.l'"

Juynboll observes that in the canonical/Jadfth literature, Ijadlths displaying common links are in fact relatively rare - just a few hundred. On the other hand there are thousands of traditions, which, when their istuids are charted, display a spider pattern. That is, it first appears that there is an early common link, the Prophet, a Companion, or a Successor, but upon closer observation almost all the fanning out occurs in single strands - no transmitter having more than one or two alleged students. See Diagram 5. Juynboll suggests that these spiders should be interpreted as having developed not downwards, but upwards: "the later transmitters/collectors invented single strands bridging the time gap between themselves and a suitably early, fictitious or historical, [person] ."106 For these spiders,Juynboll notes, it is impossible to draw conclusions about their chronology, provenance, or authorship. There is one major problem with the conclusions Juynboll draws from the spider pattern. If a report from the Prophet were in fact genuine and faithfully transmitted, its transmission pattern might well resemble the spider pattern. Clearly, one's assumptions on the nature of isnads can dictate how one interprets this pattern.

In elaborating and refining Schacht's methods and theories, Juynboll has made considerable advances in determining the chronology, provenan(;t:, and authorship of specific hndiths. H(! has found a way 1,0 salvage hi,~Iori(';tl information from at least pall or the isniid.11I7 Yel Ihl' nu-rhods <lndo!,l'd by 1"'1'1111011 allow oulv 1('1.111\11'1" '.'W Iliulilhs'lo hI' lidly

Diagram 3

Prophet

I

Companion

I

Successor

(Successor)

I

COMMON LINK

transmitter transmitter transmitter transmitter
n n n n
collection collection collection collection collection collection collection collection Diagram 4

transmitter

transmitter

transmitter

transmitter

transmitter

transmitter

transmitter

transmitter

INVERTED COMMON LINK

I

transmitter

transmitter

transmitter

collection 10:\

The Development of Exegesis in Early Islam

Hadith Criticism

Diagram 5

Fulan 3

I

and leads them to a logical contradiction. They combine the two and define sunna to be the normative practice of the Muslim community. Rahman asks, "what sense does it make to say that the normative quality was sought to be conferred on the actual practice by makingit the Sunna of the Prophet?"I09 Rahman's goal in highlighting what he perceives to be a contradiction is to undermine the claim of Margoliouth, Lammens, and Schacht that surma (the practice of the community) preceded by nearly a century its embodiment in lJadtths. At least according to his reading of Goldziher, he and Goldziher see the two as having a common origin and being consubstantial.

Rahman then criticizes Schacht's suggestion - that lJadtths with isnads reaching back to the Prophet originated not before the middle of the second century - as being too simple and causing insoluble problems. For Rahman, the sunna varied from place to place. Al-Shafi"! simply introduced the concept of the sunna of the Prophet into Muslim jurisprudence in a systematic way. He cannot be used as evidence that such was not the case from the very beginning of Islam in at least some places or in some less systematic way. On the other hand, Rahman has words of praise for Schacht's method of comparing different versions of lJadiths and for his conclusions that some lJad'iths did not exist in the early period and that later versions tend to contain more information than earlier ones. Like Azami, he cautions that one should be careful with this method since it is possible that earlier reports of a lJ,aduh might be less complete simply because the full details only became available with wider contact with Companions and Successors.

With this critique of the Western position, Rahman then moves to his own theory. In terms of being sceptical about the literal authenticity of lJad'iths, he is not much less so than Goldziher and Schacht and certainly not significantly less so than Juynboll. He states:

Prophetic Surma, outside the fundamental matters touching the religious and the social and moral life of the Community, could not have been very large, let alone being of such titanic inclusiveness of all the details of daily life as medieval law and Hadtth literature make out to be the case. IlO

Prophet
I

alternative Companion Companion
I
Fulan Successor
II I I

Fulan Fulan 2 Fulan 1
III I I I
Ilil I
Fulan Fulan Fulan Fulan
I I I I
Fulan Fulan Fulan 4 Fulan 5
I I I I
I I I I
Fulan Fulan Fulan Fulan Fulan Fulan
I I I I I I Fulan

Fulan

I

Fulan

I

Fulan

I

Collector 7 Collector 6 Collector 5 Collector 4 Collector 3 Collector 2 Collector 1108

analyzed in this manner. For the others, perhaps the majority, he, like Goldziher and Schacht before him, simply resigns himself to being uncertain.

" ,

F. Rahman and an Attempt to Save the Sunna

Fazlur Rahman stands in a somewhat unique position. On the one hand, he has accepted some of the general conclusions reached by Goldziher: haduhs are by and large not historical. On the other hand, as a Muslim, he hesitates to dismiss the lJadtths in the canonical collections and the Prophet's surma as spurious. His theory on the origin and development of lJad'iths suggests that, while the isnnd of a lJadith may well be fabricated and perhaps even the wording of the matn, the gist of the matn is still prophetic and therefore normative for Muslims.

In his book, Islam, Rahman begins his chapter on IJad'iths and the surma by examining the work of Goldziher, Margoliouth, Lammens and Schacht. He credits Goldziher with seeing the difference between the normative conduct of the community and the actual practice of the community: the former is the sunna and the latter the actual state of affairs. It ill this distinction according 1.0 Rahman that was overlooked hy the other rhree

Muhammad had made pronouncements in an ad hoc manner, not in a systematic way as suggested by the canonical collections. Yet that does not mean Rahman doubts that the activities and sayings of Muhammad wen: not preserved in some manner as the Qur~an itself and other documents were, especially since these words and actions were (as the Qur'an itself attests) considered normative. Hence, an informal tradition can be assumed during the lifetime of the Muhamrnad.U!

A slightly more formal tradition developed after the death of Mul.I'IIllllHUI in that new Muslims would naturally enquire about the

IIII

The Deoelopment of Exegesis in Early Islam

Hadith Criticism

I I

I

G. Schoeler and the Oral/Written Distinction

Despite the attempts by Abbott and Sezgin to lay the issues of oral versus written transmission of early Islamic "texts" to rest, the debate continues. Their arguments, while perhaps quite convincing to some, are not consistent with the evidence supplied by these texts as we have received them, The fact is that there are significant, and at times e-ven 1I100"llilll(, variances hC'IW('t'1l different n'("~lHIiOlHI of Ill(' It';lC'hiIlKIlI of .. Illulkllh",

early Muslim authority. Certainly Sezgin's optimism that earlier, original texts could be reconstructed from later compilations seems unjustified. But does this fact also mean that the written transmission argument put forward by Abbott and Sezgin has been refuted? No, says Gregor Schoeler. In a series of four articles he presents an alternate conception of the mode of transmission of knowledge in the various branches of the Islamic sciences. By suggesting a mixed mode of oral and written transmission, he attempts to preserve the authenticity ofthe material as it exists today, while still accounting for the observed variances.l-"

Schoeler begins with the question of whether or not written texts of Ij,adfths were prevalent prior to the collections of al-Bukhari and Muslim. Goldziher would say not, Sezgin yes. Schoeler argues against Goldziher's interpretation that encomia, such as ma ra'aytu ft yadi-hi kitaban qal{u (I never saw a book/something written in his hands), of early scholars mean t that they shunned the use of written materials. Just because they did not employ written notes during their public lectures, does not mean that they did not have recourse to such written materials privately.

Even if the shaykh did not use notes, his students likely did, and so the ways in which they preserved and further transmitted the work contributed to the development of different recensions. The students either recorded the content of the lecture in written form during its presentation or later (when they themselves wished to transmit it) from memory or according to another source, such as that of an exemplary copy of the teachings from the shaykh's circle of students. (Of course, if one student recorded the teachings using another student's copy, the former would feel no obligation to cite the author of that copy in his own isniid.) Furthermore, a shaykh, over the years of lecturing, might well present the material differently at different times, thus providing another point of departure for the existence of differing transmissions or recensions of a work. This process of diversification of an authority's teaching was further aided by several factors, according to SchoeIer. For a time many scholars did not write and publish their own works, but preferred to leave that task to their students. The Muwa{fa' of Malik ibn Anas is a good example of this practice. Therefore, it is not always possible to distinguish between author and transmitter during the early centuries of Islam.

Thus SchoeIer has argued for a different understanding of the transmission of early Islamic material. He has tried to mitigate the strict distinction between oral and written transmission of materials and thus, "seen correctly, it appears that here writing and orality are more complimentary than mutally exclusive.t''!" This theory accounts for the variation observed in different recensions of the teachings of a particular authority. Yct at the same time the authenticity of each recension is maintained. Moreover. not only does the variation itself preclude any attempt 10 I'(,C'CIIUll'lIc'l 11t<: "original" (in 11t(' manner advocated hy

I I

words and deeds of Muhammad, /sniids, which are for Rahman a sign of the formalized discipline of haduh, appeared much later, around the turn of the first century (though the informal use of haduhs began somewhere between the years 60 and 80).ll2

A unique contribution from Rahman is his theory of the "silent" transmission of Prophetic sunna, That is, many early Muslims simply lived out the words and acts of Muhammad. And this silent, living tradition, the tradition of what Muslims actually did, is the sunna. And so Rahman states, "that the Sunna and Hadith were coeval and consubstantial in the earliest phase after Muhammad and that both were directed towards and drew their normativity from him. "113 However, as time passed the succeeding generations of Muslims made additions to both the sunna and the ~adfth and this led to a disharmony between them (though in general, they were uniform). Eventually this situation led to a need to standardize practices, and the manner in which this was accomplished was the codification of ~adiths. At first haduhs were referred back only to Companions because they embodied the words and acts of Muhammad and because the discipline of the isnad had not yet fully developed. Rahman credits al-Shafft for the place achieved by Ij,aduhs in the hearts of Muslims. But the resultant codification and attempt to bring the sunna under the aegis of the sunna of the Prophet (read: prophetic Ij,adzths) led to a massive fabrication of lJ.adfths. And according to Rahman, Muslims were largely successful in bringing the whole of the living tradition (sunna) into the sunna. And thus hadtths (surma of the Prophet) and sunna (the silent living tradition also rooted in the acts and words of the Prophet) were consubstantial in content once again. 114 As a result, the sunna as currently embodied in lJ.adzths remains normative (though somewhat more flexible).

Clearly his goal is to save the surma, not to devise a new method of isnad criticism. For Rahman the very charge made by the Western sceptics, that Ij,adfths are merely an attempt to give the actual practice of the Community prophetic authority, is irrelevant. The actual practice of the Community was already prophetic, at least in spirit if not always in detail. So while the isniids may well be fabricated and in some sense the matns as well, the haduhs nevertheless remain prophetic.U"

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