Nukbatuk Fikr_L1

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Lessons on Nukhbatul Fikr

Presented by: Sheikh Tariq Appleby

Lesson 1 - Part 1

.

[Alhamduliallah Rab Al'alamin, wa Alsalahto wa Alsalam 'ala Ashraf Alanbiaa' wa

Almorsalin, Nabina Mohammad wa 'ala Aleh wa sahbeh Agma'ien]

[Assalamo 'alaykom wa Rahmato Allah wa Barakatoh]

I would like to welcome all of you, Insha'Allah, the students of the Student's Guild tothis second semester in which we will study the book of Nukhbatul Fikr by Alhafez Ibn Hajar ( Rahemaho Allah Ta'ala).

I hope Insha'Allah that your first semester was successful, that the exams were easy and thatyou benefited greatly Insha'Allah Ta'ala.

Insha'Allah, in this semester we will be studying the book, Nukhbatul Fikr by Ibn Hajar, andwe hope Insha'Allah to finish them in 10 lessons. Before we start, there are two things that wenormally discuss before we study a book; the first is we talk about the author, and secondly

we talk about the book itself, and then we actually get into the explanation of this particular book.

So, Firstly, about the author, Alhamdulillah my brother and friend sheikh Bilal Isma'iel hasalready covered the biography of Ibn Hajar (Rahemaho Allah) in his introduction to the book "Bulugh Al-Maram", as Ibn Hajar was the author of Bulugh Al-Maram and Nukhbatul Fikr,so , he already has covered that , so there is no need to repeat that here.

Secondly, what about the book? First we need to talk about the title of the book and exactlywhat it means, and then we can talk about some beneficial things about the book itself that

perhaps are not normally discussed.

So, Firstly, the book is called:

"Nukhbatul Fikr Fi Mustalah Ahl Al-Athar"

So, what we would like to do here is to go slowly through it word for word and explain itInsha'Allah, and therefore, get a broad deep meaning of what the title means.

So, let us start with the word " Nukhba ", Nukhba literally means the best of something or something that is chosen. And "Al-fikr " is the plural of the Arabic word "Fikra "

which is a "thought". The word "Fi " as you all know means "in"; "Mustalah " this to

Nukhbatul Fikr – Lesson 1 Term 3 1



be explained, Insha'Allah, so that whenever we use the word " Mustalah Alhadith" in the future, in the upcoming lessons, you will know exactly what I am talking about

and there will be no confusion.

The word "Mustalah " comes from the Arabic word "Istalah " which means (to

agree), so we could say (Istalah Qawm 'Ala Katha) means a certain group of people agreed on a particular matter. And what does it mean technically? And when I saytechnically, I don’t mean in the sciences of Hadith, I mean just technically amongst scholarsin general, what does the word "Mustalah" mean? It means:

(Itefaq Ta'efaten Makhsousaten 'Ala Amren Makhsous, Itha Otleqa Ensarafa Ilaihem)

It is the agreement of particular group of specialists, of scholars on a particular matter or term,when it is used without restriction; automatically it goes back to them.

So in the sciences of Hadith, if I used the word "Mursal ", automatically we know thatthis is a term used exclusively by the Muhadethin . So, next we need to know, if weknow what the word "Mustalah" means, then we need to know what "Mustalahul Hadith

" is. And Insha'Allah I will leave that for later, we will talk about his Insha'Allahwhen Ibn Hajar starts his introduction. The word "Ahl " literally means family, but here itis more specific and it means the people of, and he says "Al-Athar ", meaning the peopleof Hadith. All of these terms, Insha'Allah, will be discussed in more detail later, and we willsee whether they are used the synonyms or whether there is some different some meaning

between them.Ibn Hajar, Rahemaho Allah, he wrote this book in the year 812 H., and he wrote itsexplanation " Nuzahtul Nazar ". One of his students "Al-Ashmouni " wrotean explanation of this book "Nukhbatul Fikr", but Ibn Hajar, Rahemaho Allah, wasn’tsatisfied with his student's explanation and he said: (Sahebul Bayt AdraBema Fih) that is the person, the owner of a house, is more knowledgeable about what is in it.So he took it upon himself to explain this book in a book called " Nuzahtul Nazar "which is about four to five times bigger than the text itself. He didn’t write this book whiletravelling as claimed by "Ibn Al-wazir Al-Yamani", and later emphasized by another Yamani

scholar called "Al-Amir Alsan'ani", the author of " Subul Assalam ",in, we can call it,in his book of poetry of Nukhbatul Fikr, he mentions that Ibn Hajar Rahemaho Allah wrote

Nukhbatul Fikr while travelling, but Alsakhawi , the student of Ibn Hajar RahemahoAllah, he says: " My sheikh wrote it in the year 812 , and Ibn Hajar did not travel in that year.

Now, this book is very concise, it is only about 8 to 12 pages depending on your copy, so weneed to know, especially you as a student, you need to know that we are not going to cover every single aspect of Mustalah or the sciences of Hadith in this particular book. So there arecertain things that we are not going to talk about in detail, and we will postpone that until westart speaking or until we start studying the more detailed books of Mustalahul Hadith.




Now, take it back to the title, "Nukhbatul Fikr Fi Mustalah Ahl Al-Athar", it means, the chosen thoughts in the "Istelah" the terminology of the people of Hadith

or the scholars of Hadith. So, now that we know, we know something about the book itself, soit is easier for us Insha'Allah, to move on to exactly what the author intended by writing this

book.

He says:" "

I remind myself and you Insha'Allah, that the way that we are going to explain this book isthat I will read the Arabic, and then I will read the translation, and then we will explain itInsha'Allah word for word. If examples need to be given, we will give examples. And whenno discussions are really needed, we will move on as the terms or as the phrases are extremelyclear and there is no need for much explanation.

He says: "

In the name of Allah, Merciful and Compassionate

Now, it is the Sunnah of the scholars that they start their books by mentioning the basmalah,or . Allah Subhanaho wa Ta'ala, the Quran starts with , that's firstly;secondly , the prophet (Salla Allah 'alih wa sallam) in his books , or rather in his letters to thekings and emperors of his time, he started them with . And also the scholars have takenthat the basis in the Quran and the Sunnah and they also started their books with "

".

He then says: "" Praise be to Allah, or praise to Allah who never

ceases be knowing able.

So the author starts with "Alhamdulillah" or Alhamdalah , which means to praise Allah,subhanaho wa Ta'ala, and this Hamd means that we mention Allah, Subhanaho wa Ta'ala, byhis beautiful names and perfect attributes and we do so in a manner of love and pleasure.

So, some scholars have mentioned the difference between " Alhamd " and "AlShuokr ", they show gratitude, is Alhamd is done, or rather Alhamd WA Almadh,

sorry, Alhamd and Almadh the difference between them is: " Alhamd ", this praise isdone with love; "Almadh ", this praise is done with love or without love. You just want to

praise someone, you know, not because you like the person, just because you want to bediplomatic, this is called Madh , and if you love that person and want to praise that

person, that is called Alhamd.

The next thing is that: the Quran starts with " ", and therefore, this is the first proof of the scholars when they start their books with Alhamdulillah . Secondly, the prophet(Salla Allah 'alih wa sallam) in his Khotbas , or his sermons or his Khotab , whichis the proper Arabic plural for the word " Khotba", the prophet (Salla Allah 'alih wasallam) starts " ... " (In Alhamda llillah) towards the end of the Khotba of haja

. So from those two proofs from Quran and Sunnah, the scholars also have started their books with the Hamd of Allah subhanaho wa Ta'ala.




Now , the other thing than love in the word, Alhamdu ,means, it indicates that all praiseis for Allah Subhanaho wa Ta'ala, so if we translate it "The Hamd" which means all types of Hamd are for Allah Subhanaho wa Ta'ala. Why? Because Allah is the one who has created us,Allah is the one who sustains us, Allah subhanaho wa Ta'ala is the one who has guided us toIslam, and what a Ne'ma , Allah subhanaho wa Ta'ala has guided us and make it easy for

us to study this deen (Religion) Alhamdulillah, may Allah subhanaho wa Ta'ala make it easyfor all of us Insha'Allah.

He never ceases to be knowing, so, this is one of the attributes of Allah subhanaho wa Ta'ala,Al'elm Knowledge, Allah subhanaho wa Ta'ala knows everything. 'Aleman or 'AlimanQadira " , these are two different words used in the manuscripts; 'Alimand 'Alem . but basically, the closest to that which is written by the author, and this is avery subtle point that needs to be made here, that when the scholars , when they speak aboutTahqiq , checking and verification of manuscripts, then what they are aiming for is to getthat particular manuscript or copy that is closest to what the author actually wrote and the best, is that if you could find a copy that was written by the author himself, and then second after that is a copy written by one of the students of the sheikh. The one that I have used is a copythat was taken down by one of the students of the Sheikh and in it; it says " 'AlemanQadira"." Qadira " meanins capable, and in here meaning capable of anything, so AllahSubhanaho WA Ta'ala, is capable of anything.

Now, many of us, we become disbanded when we study, and when we are seekingknowledge, and you know, sometimes it becomes really difficult for us, the work load

becomes a lot, but, we need to know that if we ask Allah subhanaho wa Ta'ala Sincerely and

put in the effort, so Allah is capable of doing anything, and Allah is capable of making it easyfor us.

The author then says:

""

May Allah bless our liege lord Muhammad whom he sent to mankind as a bearer of goodtidings and a warning?

In this part, the author now is sending salutations upon the prophet Salla Allah 'Alih wa

Sallam, and Al-salah from Allah Subhanaho wa Ta'ala has one of the following meanings:Allah praises the prophet Salla Allah 'Alih wa Sallam , in the presence of the Angels, or

bestowing blessings, or Sallah from Allah means mercy and from the angels, salah on the prophet Salla Allah 'Alih wa Sallam is they seeking forgiveness for him.

So, these are different opinions and we are not going into which one is the correct.Alhamdulillah, there seems to be no apparent contradiction between any of them.

The next he says " 'Ala Saydena ", the " sayed", the word was used by the prophetSalla Allah 'Alih wa Sallam, our liege lord or our lord, or our liege, the two words used

together, seems to be for emphasis, but the prophet Salla Allah 'Alih wa Sallam said in thehadith:




""

"I am the leader of the children of Adam without any bragging, without any boasting"

So the prophet Salla Allah 'Alih wa Sallam himself used this word, but then a point out I wantto make, Insha'Allah before I go into this in more detail, is that , in the Do'aa after theAthan and in the Tashahoud it is not sunnah to say "Saydena ". For example,when we are sitting in Tashahoud, we say:" Allahum sally 'ala Muhammad wa 'ala AlMuhammad ", and in many books of fikh it says you shouldsay:" Allahum sally 'ala Saydena Muhammad " and this incorrect , asIbn Hajar, Rahemaho Allah, himself and his student Alsakhawi, they mentioned that in nonarration did the prophet (Salla Allah 'alih wa sallam) teach his companions to say "SaydenaMuhammad ,or wa 'ala Saydena Muhammad or wa 'ala Al Saydena Muhammad , so this isincorrect. Rather, when it comes to the Do'aa after the Athan, and the do'aa of the salawat inthe salah, it is important that the Muslim strict himself to what the prophet (Salla Allah 'alih

wa sallam) taught.

What this means is, the word "Sayed", it means that the prophet (Salla Allah 'alih wa sallam)is the best amongst us and he has the highest status. Also he will be the leader in the day of Qiama , when everyone will turn to their prophets, but their prophets will notintercede for them, and every one will come to the prophet (Salla Allah 'alih wa sallam) andhe will intercede for us, may Allah subhanaho wa Ta'ala, grant us his intercession on that day.

He then says:" ", whom Allah Subhanaho wa Ta'ala sent to mankindas a bearer of good tidings and as a Warner. So the prophet (Salla Allah 'alih wa sallam) Allah

sent him with a responsibility of conveying the message; a bearer of good tidings to thosewho would believe in him, in this religion, and in this Islam that he has brought. And then hesays "Warner", against those who disbelieve in him of Jahanam . So he brings gladtidings to those who believe in him and obey him, that they will enter Jannah , and thosewho disbelieve in him and disobey him, that they will enter Jahanam.

The author then says:" ", and upon his folk, in brackets herehe might want to add (his family), his companions and many salutations. Now, there are four opinions regarding what the word " " means, meaning his family, the prophet (Salla Allah'alih wa sallam) family, his folk. So some scholars say, it is that they are those people upon

whom zaka and charity is not permissible, it is Haram for them to accept charity. Anexample of that would be: the prophet (Salla Allah 'alih wa sallam) saw one of his grandsons

picking up a date, and the prophet (Salla Allah 'alih wa sallam) feared that one of that datewould actually be a date of Sadaqah ,of charity, that it belong to bayt Almal or thetreasury . The prophet (Salla Allah 'alih wa sallam) told him:"Kehk, Kehk " this is theArabic word used to tell a child that a particular thing is disgusting and he shouldn’t eat it, heshouldn’t place it in his mouth. So the prophet (Salla Allah 'alih wa sallam) explained to himthat Sadaqah is not permissible for the family of the prophet (Salla Allah 'alih wa sallam).

Number two or the second opinion is that it includes his children and his wives specifically,

no one else but the prophet's (Salla Allah 'alih wa sallam) wives and children. The third




opinion is: it is his followers until the day of Qiamah, and the fourth opinion is that it is the pious people in this Umma .

Ibn Alqaiem, Rahemaho Allah, in his book " Jalaa' Alafham " which is a book aboutsalawat , the different types of salawat, and the virtues of Salawat, an excellent book

Insha'Allah that hopefully it will be translated in the future into English, he says that the firstopinion which says , it is, they are those upon whom zakah and charity is Haram ,that this is the correct opinion, closely after it is the second, the third and the fourth opinionsare weak opinions , they have no real strong basis neither in the language nor do they havestrong basis in the Shari'ah .

He then says " " and upon his companions, and the definition of companion or Sahabi, Insha'Allah, we will discuss that later, we will talk about it in detail; who exactly a

companion is? What is the definition of a sahabi? And what are the different aspects of acompanion…






Lesson 1 - Part 2

He then says " "and upon his companions, and the definition of companion or Sahabi, Insha'Allah, we will discuss that later, we will talk about it in detail; who exactly a

companion is? What is the definition of a sahabi? And what are the different aspects of acompanion, for example, just to encourage us, to make us excited about, you know, what weare about to talk about later: what if someone met the prophet (Salla Allah 'alih wa sallam)as a disbeliever, he came as a messenger from one of the kings, he came as an idol worshipper or a Christian, he met with the prophet (Salla Allah 'alih wa sallam) , sat with him, you know,Subhan Allah, you know what I think about that? I think that, just imagine, we were able to sitin one of the gatherings of the prophet (Salla Allah 'alih wa sallam), you know, how wouldyou feel? But I can tell you that it is full possible for Muslims to sit in the gatherings of the

prophet (Salla Allah 'alih wa sallam) when they sit and they sit in the gatherings of thehadith of the prophet (Salla Allah 'alih wa sallam) .this is why Imam Shafe'ie ,Rahemaho Allah, he says:" when I see one of the scholars of Hadith, it is as if I see one of thecompanions of the prophet (Salla Allah 'alih wa sallam) , because just being in thatatmosphere, listening to the words of the prophet (Salla Allah 'alih wa sallam) ,someonespeaking about the prophet's description, just sitting in that kind of gathering, it is as if youare there. And the poet says of the people of hadith that they are so lucky, that although they

are not actually there with the prophet (Salla Allah 'alih wa sallam) , they are accompanyinghis words, when they speak it and when they teach it to one another. So, Insha'Allah, thedefinition of a Sahabi, we will talk about it later, Insha'Allah.

And he then says:" ", Allah Subhanaho wa Ta'ala sends many salutations uponthe prophet (Salla Allah 'alih wa sallam), and that is there for emphasis.

The author then says:" " (Amma Ba'd), to commence. Some translators when theytranslate " ", they translate it as (as to what follows), and basically that translation iscloser to what the word means, as to what follows, as to what to come after.

, is used to, is used as a means of moving from one type of address to another, so, he hadan introduction and is now going to speak about something else , so he breaks it up betweenthe two by using " ".

He says:

""

He says that the books of the nomenclature of hadith specialists are many. He says that the books written by the specialists of Hadith, meaning the Muhadithoun , are many. And

the word " " (Tasanif) is the plural of the Arabic word " " (Tasnif) and " " is




to write and compile according to different types and divisions, meaning to write it in a verysystematic way. So that is " ", and we find that in the books of Muhadethin, the booksare written like this.

He then says, " " (Fi Istelah), we have already discussed what Istelah and Mustalah

mean, but to give you a definition what the word "Mustalahul hadith " means: itmeans knowledge of the principles through which the status and condition of the narrator andthe narrated are known. One more time: Mustalahul hadith is knowledge of the principlesthrough which the status and condition of the narrator and narrated are known.

Now there are few words that are synonymous with Mustalahul Hadith; the first is "" (Osoul Alhadith), the fundamentals of hadith. The second title also used in Mustalahul

Hadith is " " (Qaua'edul hadith), the principles of hadith. And lastly, another wordused is " " ('olumul hadith), the sciences of hadith.

So all four words, Mustalahul Hadith, Osoul Alhadith, 'olumul hadith and Qaua'edul hadith,they all mean the same thing, and what do they mean? They mean: knowledge of the principles through which the status and condition of the narrator and narrated are known.

Now, the word narrator, the Arabic word for the word narrator is " ", and if you added theAlef and lam for it, it becomes " ". So Insha'Allah from now onward, when the wordnarrator is used in the text, then I will use the word " " (Al-Rawy). And narrated that isthe "Maten )") meaning the actual text of the hadith is called the "Maten", that is what isnarrated.

Now, he says that there are many books of Mustalahul hadith, and amongst the first people toauthor in this particular science is Imam Al-Shafe'ie, Rahemaho Allah Ta'ala. Now, theShafe'ie scholars they say that "can you see how great our Imam is? He was the first to writein " " (Osoulul Fiqh), he was one of the first people to write in Mustalahul hadith",

but the book " " (Al Resalah), which they claim is a book of Osoulul Fiqh and a book of Mustalahul hadith, it only speaks, you know, about a few general concepts of Mustalahulhadith, it isn’t a book. But what they can, or what we can say, is that Imam Shafe'ie ,Rahemaho Allah, was amongst the first to talk about this particular subject in great detail, andis amongst the first that we have , you know , recorded, obviously, the scholars of hadiththemselves, they spoke about Mustalahul hadith in their own gatherings and they mention

different technical issues. So, the first person really to write about this in some sort of waywas Imam Shafe'ie, Rahemaho Allah. Imam Shafe'ie was born in the year 150 H., and died inthe year 204H.

Just look at that, subhan Allah, if Allah , subhanaho wa Ta'ala, wants to place (Baraka) ina person's life, he lives for 54 years, but yet, to this day we remember him , his books remainand he did so much and he was of such a great benefit to the Umma, and he only lived for 54years.




We ask Allah, subhanaho wa Ta'ala, to place Baraka in our time, and that Allah gives us theability to learn as much as we can in the short space, or the short life that Allah Subhanaho waTa'ala has given us, and that we can benefit ourselves and others, Insha'Allah.

The next person is "Abu Mohamed Aramhormuzi " what was his name? Abu

Mohamed Aramhormuzi, by Allah, the first time I heard this, I told the teacher, you know, please repeat that, say it again sheikh, Aramhormuzi, it took some time to get it on your tongue, and Alhamdulillah , now I feel that it is easy, Aramhormuzi, and his book is called "

" (Al- Muhadithul Fasel). Now, this book discusses many aspects of Mustalah, but it focuses primarily on those aspects of the etiquette of narrating, who is suitable to be ascholar of Hadith, when can the student start studying, when he can start narrating to, whenhe can start teaching, and these matters. So it is not a very comprehensive book on Mustalahulhadith, but it does include important aspects.

The next person, who came after Aramhormuzi, was Abu 'Abd Allah Al Kakem Al-Nisaboury

and he wrote a book which is called "" (TheKnowledge of the sciences of Hadith). This book also is based on those who preceded him,and also there were some issues there that, you know, some sections of Mustalahul hadithwhich didn’t include certain issues that were not really, they were not placed in the proper sequence, and subhan Allah, perfection is only for Allah subhanaho wa Ta'ala.

There were scholars after that, but the most notable amongst them was "Alkhatib Albaghdadi", he lived obviously, as his name says, in the city of Baghdad in Iraq, and this

person had the greatest influence on those who to come after him before Ibn Alsalah, we will talk about him later Insha'Allah. Alkhatib Albaghdadi, the most famous book that he

wrote in Mustalahul hadith is called " " (Alkefayah fi 'elm Alrewaiah) "Thatwhich is sufficient in the science of narration", and he wrote this book, but he also wrotemany separate books on the different types of Mustalahul hadith. And as Ibn Noqtah ,Rahemaho Allah, he says, "whoever is honest and unbiased, he will admit that everymuhadith after Khatib Albaghdadi was dependent upon his books". And we can see thatany book came after Khatib Albaghdadi, quotes from the books of Khatib Albaghdadi.

The person that is most notable after, is Abu 'Amr Ibn Alsalah , fromDamascus, the shafe'ie scholar, the Muhadith . He wrote a book, which also called "

", but was famous as" , or " " (Muqademat IbnAlSalah (The Introduction of Ibn Alsalah, or The Introduction to the sciences of hadith. AndThis person, he wrote this book as, he basically compiled a text book which he dictated to hisstudents, they took notes and therefore, we find that his book also was not in a proper sequence and there were many things that could have been placed in a better way, better sequence, flowing logically from a subject matter to a subject matter. But Alhamdulillah, this

book was of great benefit to the students at that time, and to the scholars who came after thatso much. So it cannot be counted, how many have summarized this book, have writtenexplanations of this book, have converted this book into poetry, have written summaries of it.So Alhamdulillah, this book was of great benefit and there was lots of Baraka in this.

He then says:" " and expanded and condensed.




So the books of Mustalah, they were those books that were lengthy and detailed, and theywere also those books which were condensed. From amongst those that were lengthy, what dowe mean by lengthy? Why were they lengthy? The reason why they were lengthy is because,the scholars not only mention the different types of hadith and their classification, but theyalso mentioned the disagreements amongst the scholars of hadith on these particular issues.

They spoke about whether or not, you know, this particular definition was sound, was thereany criticism on this definition, then they spoke about different proofs on certain issues. Theyalso went to giving lengthy examples, you know, and discussing whether or not theseexamples are suitable for the definitions, and so many different other issues. So obviouslywhen you get into this kind of discussion, the book becomes lengthy, right. And examples of lengthy books are books like:" " Fathul Mughith, by Alshakhawi, the student of IbnHajar, its latest print is in five volumes, so that's lengthy. In the science of hadith if you wantto compare look at the book "Nukhbatul Fikr" which is in Mustalahul hadith, and FathulMughith, which is in five volumes, each volume about 400 to 500 pages long, so it is a very,

very big book. Another book, and that is the book which we studied in Medina and is called "" (Tadrib Al-rawy) and literally it means (The training of the Rawy), training of the rawy, subhan Allah, a very suitable title and it is in two volumes, and also a very detailed

book giving many examples, and also mentioning the disagreement of the scholars of hadithon certain issues.

He says " " and they were condensed. Now, there are many reasons why books werecondensed and summarized, one of them is to facilitate the knowledge , make it easy to studyand memorize, and some other reasons are that it makes it easy to be carried around. Imaginethe difference between carrying one volume, one small volume, and carrying around five

volumes. It also acts as a reminder to the specialist, just in case, you know, he wants to knowabout a particular word or a definition, he can just refer to his summary.

Now, Ibn Hajar, Rahemaho Allah, he has many books in Mustalah, and there is one that islengthy, it is about 2 volumes , it is called " " (AlNouqat 'ala IbnAlsalah) ,meaning , it is a book in which he criticizes, or goes into a more detailedexplanation of what Ibn Alsalah mentioned. It is in two volumes and even by mentioning that,I also need to tell you, that he didn’t finish it, meaning there were still sections that needed tofinish and he passed away before completing it. And the book: Nukhbatul Fikr is an exampleof a book which is condensed.

Another book also that is very condensed is the book " " by Ibn Kathier , and he summarized that book from the book of Ibn Alsalah.

Ibn Hajar then says: " ", one of my brothers asked that Isummarize for them what is important from that - in brackets you could place (From that,meaning from the books that we have just talked about, the lengthy, the expanded and allthose many books). someone asked Ibn Hajar , Rahemaho Allah, that: " " thestudy of Mustalahul hadith , you know there are so many books, it becomes confusing for thestudents, if you could perhaps summarize this for us , it will simplify it for us. And subhan

Allah, you know, a teacher used to tell us that, you know, we used to ask, ya sheikh isn’t there




a summary for this book isn’t there an abridged version, it is so big, and he said: subhanAllah, that every generation the students become lazier and lazier.That, You know, thestudents in the time of the sahaba and after that, they were very enthusiastic, eager, they werewilling to put in the hard work, but every generation we become lazier , may Allah subhanahowa Ta'ala make it easy, but, Ibn Hajar, Rahemaho Allah , he summarized this. And Alsakhawi

mentioned that there are two possibilities about that person who asked Ibn Hajar tosummarize the most important aspects of Mustalah; one person could be (IbnAlJama'ah) and the other Al Zarkashi, and they were both contemporaries of IbnHajar, who also lived in Cairo.

And the reason why Ibn Hajar Rahemaho Allah wanted to do this is because he wanted toattain the reward of those who spread and disseminate knowledge. That he was able to easeand facilitate the study of Mustalahul hadith for the students, then perhaps Allah, subhanahowa Ta'ala, would reward him for trying to spread and disseminate knowledge.

He then says:" ", so I responded to his request, to this person's request, seeking to be counted among those who tracked the scholarly path.

So, if we ask ourselves, why did Ibn Hajar, Rahemaho Allah, responded to this request?Think about this : he was the Imam of his time, people come from all over to come to studyfrom him, he had a very little time, he was also a judge, so he took out from his very busyschedule to , you know, summarize the most important aspect of Mustalahul Hadith. And wefind, Subhan Allah, if we look to the Du'ah , the 'Ulamaa today, the 'ulamaa and thestudents of Knowledge, sheikh Tawfiq Alshawdery and others, may Allah reward all of themInsha'Allah, that even though they are so busy, that they have so many responsibilities, they

have their families, yet they make the time, but the scholars before them were even busier than this. But as Ibn Hajar, Rahemaho Allah, says: they are seeking to be counted amongthose who tracked the scholarly path, that I summarized this, I responded to the request of my

brother because I wanted to be counted amongst the scholars of Hadith. And look at that,Allah, subhanaho wa Ta'ala, accepted this Do'aa, Allah, subhanaho wa Ta'ala, included IbnHajar, Rahemaho Allah, amongst the scholars of Hadith.

Insha'Allah we will end here, we will take a break and will be back after few minutes.







Lesson 1 - Part 3


Welcome back.

Insha'Allah we will continue with the author where he says:

" "( so I say), now the author now is moving on from speaking about the reasons why hewrote the book and, you know, many of the things that, you know, certain aspects of Mustalah, that he just want to give a brief introduction to, then he says he gets into the actual

–what can we call it?- the meaty part of the book, so he says " " , so I say, Ibn Hajar,rahemaho Allah,:

""

The path of the report is either without specific number,ok, the translation here needs somecorrection: The paths of a report are either without specific number, not the path, but rather,the paths. So the word " ", let us go through it Insha'Allah, the word " " (Khabr), is thatwhich is reported, and spoken about linguistically. So if I asked you what is the meaning of the word " ", you would reply, that it is , that which is reported or anything spoken about , a

piece of news, or anything like that. And what is it mean in technical terms according to theMuhadethin- there is some disagreement about its exact meaning- although the majority of Muhadethin, they hold that the word " " is synonymous with the word Hadith. And Hadithis everything which has been reported from the prophet Salla Allah 'Alih wa Sallam, whether it is sayings, actions or tacit approval. For our teaching purposes, Insha'Allah, that's enough totalk about this right now.

He then says: the paths of the report are either without specific number; now the word paths,the word used in the Arabic is the word (Torok). The word is the plural of the word

(Tarieq) which mean a path. But In this case, what is meant, it means the actual Isnad.

Now a big question, and a question is asked frequently is: what is the difference between theword (Sanad) and the word ? Is there a difference between them, or do they meanexactly the same thing? According to most Muhadethin, the word "Sanad" and the word"Isnad", they use it interchangeably, meaning they use it as synonyms. But other scholars say

No; they say that Isnad is the process of reporting something by using a chain of narration. SoI say that, my father told me, whose grandfather told him and so forth and so forth until theactual piece of information or news is reported. The process of doing that, that is Isnad, but

the actual people in the chain of narration are called, this particular chain of narration is calledthe sanad. So, I hope that is clear Insha'Allah, that according to most scholars, the words Isnad




and sanad, they mean exactly the same thing, and other scholars say no, there is a slightdifference, that Isnad is narrating something with a sanad, and a sanad is the actual chain of narration.

Now he says "without specific number", and, what this means is that there are no exact, you

know, there isn’t a limit to the amount of narrators that report that particular hadith, ok? And,Insha'Allah we will move on to that later when we get into Motawater and exactly whatit is, but, so we have explained that, let's move on.

He says: " ", or they are specific or limited but they are more than two,right. So they are not an unlimited amount but rather, we look at them and we can see that, welook at the path of the hadith and we see that they are more than two, but they are limited, andwe will discuss it again later Insha'Allah when we talk about (Ahad) also.

He then says:" " or they have two parts or two Sanads, " ". Now this brings me to a

good point actually that, you know, I almost forgot to mention, is that the plural of the wordis Asanid. What is the plural of the word Isnad? Asanid. So Insha'Allah instead of using the word paths, we will use that Insha'Allah Ta'Ala. Tayeb, " ", or it is only hasone path, there is only one Isnad for this particular hadith. Now the author, what he has doneis that he has followed, what he has done firstly is now he is dividing the hadith or hadith ingeneral in the manner in which it reached us. How did the hadith reach us? Did it reach usthrough numerous Asanid, or did it reach us with only two or three or four or is it only one?This is how we are dividing it now, the manner in which the hadith has reached us.

He then says, now Ibn Hajar, Rahemaho Allah, has followed a very logical sequence, so he

goes through , he says that they are either unlimited or they are unspecified , andthen or they are specified by more than two or there are only two , or there are only one. So,in the same sequence, he is going to label each one of those four categories; so he says: "

", the first is the mass transmitted report, the Motawater report,and it conveys sure knowledge when its conditions are met. We will notice that Ibn Hajar,Rahemaho Allah, did not mention those conditions of the motawater. And some scholars thatcame after Ibn Hajar Rahemaho Allah, they have looked at this and they have said that if youhad mentioned the conditions, O Imam, It would have been more helpful, because thestudents now did not know, because if you read this for the first time, you would ask yourself:

but what are the conditions? What are the conditions before a hadith is known to beMotawater? So you have to go from this book to a more detailed book, or you would have towait until you, you know, you get access to the explanation which is called(Nuzahatul Nazar (, so they say that this is something that Ibn Hajar, Rahemaho Allah, can becriticized for. but Insha'Allah we will not deal with that much and we will mention themotawater conditions because Ibn Hajar, Rahemaho Allah, has mentioned these in theexplanation.

The word Motawater come from the verb (Tawatara) which mean to come one after the other, so we would say:




, that the rain fall down continuously drop after drop. So that whatthe word Tawatour means.

Now, If we look at what the scholars of hadith, what they discussed here, we find that thisissue of Motawater and Ahad is something that only spoken about by latest

scholars of hadith. We don’t find people like Imam Ahmad, Abd Errahamn b. Mahdi and AliB. Almadiny and Thawry and Al -Awza'y, and those scholars; we don’t find those scholars of hadith, the early scholars of hadith mentioning Motawater and Ahad. They only speak aboutSahih and Da'ief , ok?

Now that brings us to a point that, where did this come from? Where did this discussion of Motawater come from? Why did allof a sudden that hadith is divided into Motawater andAhad? We find that there were many sects after the prophet Salla Allah 'Alih wa Sallam, oneof the most dangerous amongst them was the Mou'tazelah . The Mou'tazelah was agroup of scholars, but scholars who had immersed themselves in Greek philosophy and logic

and the philosophy of other nations like the Persians and so forth. They were greatlyinfluenced by this, and we find that they first studied philosophy, and then they tried tointerpret what they read in the Quran and the Sunnah. They tried to interpret it in accordanceto that philosophy that they had learned, and whatever did not agree with this philosophy , wefind that they followed different methods of dealing with it; whatever contradicted what they

believed, or what they had in their philosophy , they either rejected it completely, or they onlyaccepted certain parts of it , certain Ahadith which they claimed , and the reason for this is

based on this particular principle , that in the issues of 'aqida , the issues of belief, theissues of creed, we can only use that which we are absolutely certain of as the basis of our

'aqida. Meaning, the Quran, obviously, there was no problem as the Quran was reported by somany people , and it was impossible, or there is absolutely no way that it is a lie , there is,you have absolute certainty about the Quran. As for hadith, we don’t know, one person or two

people narrated it, how can we be sure? And if we can't be sure, we can't use that to base our 'aqida upon that. So what did they do? They then divided the hadith of the prophet Salla Allah'Alih wa Sallam into motawater and Ahad, thereby, what basically they were trying to do?Reject every single hadith that was not Motawater, meaning that was not reported by many,many people, so much that absolute certainty was achieved. But the problem with this is thatthey themselves contradicted this method, because there are so many Ahadith which areMotawater. Let me give an example: the Ahadith which speak about the prophet's Salla Allah

'Alih wa Sallam intercession for those people of his Umma who committed major sins. So theMu'tazelah say No, there is no such thing as Shafa'ah , if a person does a major sin, that

person must be held responsible for whatever he or she did. They also held to believe that a person who committed a major sin cannot be, would not be considered a Muslim or a Kafer

, but rather he was in a place between two places, meaning he is neither a Muslim nor aKafer, but in this life he is considered to be a Muslim, and in the hereafter, they consider himto be from the people of Jahanam. So, based on that , because they believe that you must beheld responsible for what you did, and in no way anyone can benefit you after your death,meaning intercede for you or ask Allah , subhanaho wa Ta'ala, to forgive you, because of

this , they said that all of the Ahadith that speak about Shafa'ah, must be rejected. But the




problem was that, is that when we leave the study or the explanation of a particular science to people who are not specialist in it, then mistakes like this take place.

And an important issue I want to mention here is that, when the muhadethin say that this is anauthentic hadith, and then we must know that this hadith definitely the prophet Salla Allah

'Alih wa Sallam said it, even if it is reported by only one companion and there is no one elsethat reports that. Why? Because they are the specialists in the field, they are the people whodedicated their lives to the study of the Sunnah of the prophet Salla Allah 'Alih wa Sallam, noone has done more for the sunnah of the prophet Salla Allah 'Alih wa Sallam than themuhadethin, they are the specialists, and if we look at the practically jumbles in our daily life,if an engineer tells you that you have the flu, and you should take this particular medication,and a doctor tells you No, that you don’t have the flu, you have something more serious andyou should take a different medicine, what are you going to do? The sane person, the personwho Allah, subhanaho wa Ta'ala has protected his 'Aql, definitely, he is going to take theopinion of the doctor, why? Because,the Doctor is the specialist in that field. So, when theMu'tazelah started to speak about hadith, this Motawater, this is Ahad, we accept this hadith,we don’t accept that hadith, this is unacceptable, because they are not the specialists in thefield. And it is unfortunate that even today, it is very common in the Muslim world, we find

people just speaking about it, and just giving fatawa ,and they feel that because they areMuslims and they are educated, this gives them the right to just give Fatwa. Subhan Allah,how many times we sat in the company of people and they said:"no, no, no, that hadith, Ithink that hadith is not authentic" , but the hadith is in Bukhari and Muslim , and the Ummahas accepted these books , as we will discuss later, but that person, just because the hadithdoes not agree with what he believes, he says" no, unacceptable, I can't accept that hadith,

that hadith must be weak". But who are you? Who are you to say that the hadith is weak? So,I hope that Insha'Allah by mentioning that, we can understand the whole issue of Motawater and Ahad.

If for the sake of technicality you want to divide Ahadith into Motawater and Ahad,Alhamdulillah, there is nothing wrong with technical terms and classification, there isabsolutely no problem with that. The problem comes is that your intention behind thisclassification. If we said we are dividing hadith in the manner in which it reached us, intoMotawater and Ahad, simply for the sake of understanding, Alhamdulillah, we accept that andwe implement that and we teach it to our students and our teachers has taught it to us. But if

we want by dividing into Motawater and Ahad that there were certain aspects of the Sunnahwhich must be rejected because, or we cannot use it in 'aqida because it is not Motawater,then that is not correct and this is definitely a very devious and misguided approach.

Now, the definition of Motawater is that it is that which is narrated by a number of narratorsthroughout the chain of transmission. So, so much so that any chance of collusion to fabricate

becomes impossible. Let's go through that definition again, the definition of Motawater is thatwhich was narrated by a number of narrators; now, we will go through it quickly and we saythat many scholars have disagreed and this just show you, why is this classification, or what is

meant by this is very dangerous because the scholars, the Mu'tazalah and others who followthem AlMutakalemoun ,, who are the Mutakalemoun? The Mutakalemoun are those




scholars who use philosophy and logic, and they used that as the tools through which theydrive their 'aqida. And anything that is not in conformity with those tools of logic and

philosophy, anything which they find in the Quran or in the Sunnah, they either reject itcompletely, or they reinterpret it and make (Ta'weel) of it , they interpret it in such away that it now is in conformity with their innovated principles.






Lesson 1 - Part 4

Insha'Allah, hopefully that, you know, we all be able to benefit from that in the future.

He says a number, now, some of them said four, some of them said twelve, and some of themsaid forty, and all of those opinions have no proof whatsoever. And what shows us that this isnot correct, is that the prophet Salla Allah 'Alih wa Sallam, send one or two people to go andteach the deen of Islam, to go and teach people their 'aqida, to go and teach people the Quran,the sunnah, the aspects of deen, conveying his message, Salla Allah 'Alih wa Sallam, and the

prophet Salla Allah 'Alih wa Sallam, he held that was sufficient for the conveying of the

message. So we find that the prophet Salla Allah 'Alih wa Sallam, himself, did not, there wasno such thing as Motawater, No, people, the evidence against them or for them can only beestablished if I send seventeen, fifteen or twenty of my companions to them , and they all gowith the same message . So we don’t find this in the Sunnah, nor amongst the sahaba, nor amongst the tabe'ien, and that is Insha'Allah something that is important.

Number of narrators throughout the chain of transmission, then according to this definition,the Motawater hadith must have exactly a minimum amount of narrators, let's for the sake of

brevity, let's say that the correct opinion, just for argument sake, you know, for the sake of explanation, Let's say that10 narrators is what is meant and what is needed, that is theminimum amount of narrators or Rowat , that we need for the hadith to be consideredMotawater. According to the second part of the definition, those 10 narrators must be presentin every single part of the Sanad. Meaning, there must be at least 10 companions, and theremust be, in the next level, there must be at least10 Tabe'ien, and so forth, until the hadith isdocumented in Bukhari and Muslim or The Mouataa of Imam Malek, and so forth. So, this isthe second thing. Then they say: so that any chance of collusion to fabricate becomesimpossible, ok? So, they are saying that these 10 people, it must be impossible that they cameto an agreement that they are going to create a lie against the prophet Salla Allah 'Alih waSallam, it must be impossible that they have told a lie.

Now, what does the Motawater hadith benefit? Ibn Hajar, Rahemaho Allah, he says:"" and it conveys sure knowledge, certainty, absolute certainty, with no doubt. This is

what the hadith Al- Motawater means. So if I say that this hadith is motawater, then It meansthat the prophet Salla Allah 'Alih wa Sallam, definitely did this or said this, there is absolutelyno doubt in my mind, and this hadith must be used in the issues of 'aqida, must be used inFiqh, it must be evidence in those two matters.

What are the conditions that Ibn Hajar mentioned? He says:" ", it can only bring aboutthe sure knowledge, when certain conditions are met. Now, there are four conditions: the first:

the impossibility of agreement in lying, meaning that these narrators, it must be impossible




that they agree to lie; number 2: the basis of what they narrate must be something which is based on the senses, meaning something that was seen, heard, and so forth; number three, itmust be based on knowledge , not suspicion or doubt, someone can't say , I think or It is

possible, No, it must be something that the person is absolutely sure about; number four: theseconditions must be present in all levels of the sanad.

Now, like I said, for the sake of classification, there is absolutely nothing wrong here, ok? Butif you mean that we can only accept a hadith if it fulfills these conditions, and that we canonly accept it in 'aqida if these four conditions are met, then no. because the literal meaningof the word (Tawatour) is one follows the other. So even if one narrator follows or narrates that which another narrator , another rawy has narrated, ok , then this is sufficient andthat is Motawater linguistically and technically also, because , like I said before, if themuhadethin say:" " this is an authentic hadith, then definitely, that is somethingthe prophet Salla Allah 'Alih wa Sallam , said. They checked it; they verified it, from so manydifferent angles and ways, that it leaves no doubt.

And like I said, I need to mention this, that certainty is relative; something might be certain tosomeone, an example of this would be: that I would pass the house of a man, he is a veryrespected man in the community, he is very wealthy person, he is a professional person, and ,you know, I would pass his out and he comes out and he says " Oh no, my son has passed"and he starts to cry and he is whining, and I hear shouting in the house and screaming - whichis haram by the way , the prophet Salla Allah 'Alih wa Sallam, he says that there are fewthings that are from jahiliah, and Alniaha that is to whine over the dead is one of them

– but you would pass by this man's house and you hear this and he says that my youngest son

has just passed away. so immediately, when you hear that and you know this man's status inthe community and you know that he is honest and he is trustworthy, do you believe that hisson has passed away or do you not believe? Definitely, you would believe. And someone else,might not know this man, he might not be aware of this man's condition and he might hear thesame news, he might hear this man saying , my son has just passed away, and he has doubt.But according to you, you know this man, you have known him for years, so, this is theexample of the muhadethin. They are scholars of Hadith, they are experts in the field, they arespending their entire life for the Sunnah of the prophet Salla Allah 'Alih wa Sallam, and theyknow every single aspect of it. So definitely, when they authenticate a Hadith, then we shouldhold on to it and we should know that it is authentic.

Now those people who mentioned the differences between, or mentioned Motawater andAhad, they said there are two types of Motawater. The first type is (Altawator Allafzy), meaning it is Motawater in its wording, meaning that so many companionshave narrated this Hadith all with the same wording. Example of that is the Hadith of the

prophet Salla Allah 'Alih wa Sallam:

""

"Whoever lies against me then let him prepare his seat in the fire"

Again:




""

"Whoever lies against me, intentionally, then let him prepare his seat in jahanam or in thefire"

So, this is an example of a Hadith that is motawater in its wording. And the second type isMotawater in its meaning, this is called " " (Altawatour Alma'nawi). There are somany examples of this. One example is that the prophet Salla Allah 'Alih wa Sallam has , or he used to wipe over his leather socks and we know from this that the prophet Salla Allah'Alih wa Sallam wiped over his leather socks ( Almash 'ala Alkhofayen) has

been reported by so many different companions of the prophet Salla Allah 'Alih wa Sallam, or different kinds of situations and circumstance, but the meaning of that, of that Hadith that wasnarrated so many times that it is motawater in its meaning. Ok.

Another important point to mention here, is that all this discussion of motawater and Ahad is

a discussion which is based in (Osoul AlFiqh) and 'aqida, and we have alreadydiscussed how it became a discussion in 'aqida because of the Mou'tazelah, and in OsoulAlFiqh, they mentioned it because, if the Hadith is, for instance, the Hadith is motawater, andanother Hadith is Ahad, and the Ahad is in conflict with the motawater, what do we do? , for instance, we have ahadith that are reported by so many different companions of the prophetSalla Allah 'Alih wa Sallam, so we say it is motawater. then we have another narration whichis Ahad, only one companion narrated, but the two seem to contradict one another, and thereis no way for reconciling between the two of them, the Osolioun , the scholars of Osoul Alfiqh say that we then give preference to that Hadith which is motawater because somany of the companions of the prophet Salla Allah 'Alih wa Sallam have narrated it.

I remind here that early scholars, didn’t classify Hadith in this manner, meaning motawater and Ahad, and it is said that Khatib Albaghdadi was the first muhadith to introduce it toMustalah, ok?

Now, Another reminder, is that whether or not a Hadith is accurately ascribed to the prophetSalla Allah 'Alih wa Sallam, is solely the domain of the muhadethin, no one else has theauthority or has the right to say, this is a sahih Hadith, or this is not a sahih Hadith; thisHadith we can't be sure whether the prophet said it or not, except the muhadethin, thespecialists in the field. Alhamdulillah , there are many books that have been written about the

motawater Hadith, one of them is ( ) [ Al-Azhar Almoutantherah

fi Al-akhbar Al motawaterah] a book by imam Al-Siouty , rahemaho Allah, then a book after imam Siouty, ( ) [ Nazem Al-moutanather men Alhadith Al-motawatr ]

by the muhadith, Alkitany. So, these are two books, unfortunately they are not available inEnglish. And that, there Insha'Allah, should motivate each and every one of us to spend moretime learning the Arabic language so that we can broaden our horizons and Insha'Allah would

become more serious students of, you know, of 'ilm .

The author then says:" " and the second is the well known report. He says thesecond, and the second, which is narrated by more than two, but does not reach the level of motawater, he says, this is called mashhour. Literally the word (Mashhour)




means a clear matter or a matter that is well known. The technical definition is that: which isnarrated by three or more narrators in every level of the sanad or Isnad, and does not reach thelevel of tawatour , let's go through it again Insha'Allah.

It is the Hadith which has been narrated by three or more narrators in every level. Now, this

level we are talking about, the Arabic word for it is a Tabaqa, right, every level meaningevery stage of the Sanad. In every level, in every (Tabaqa) and does not reach the level of tawatour.

Now, like I said before, many of these terms are just there for explanation and for clarification. They does not exist really an issue of, you know, if a Hadith is Mashhour, thenit only can be accepted or if it is only motawater, rather whenever the Hadith is authentic, itmust be accepted.

So, let us go through the definition again: that is narrated by three or more narrators or Rowat

in every or level and does not reach the level of Tawatour. Now an example of this is the Hadith of the prophet Salla Allah 'Alih wa Sallam where hesays:

""

The Hadith of the prophet Salla Allah 'Alih wa Sallam where he says :"Indeed Allah,subhanaho wa Ta'ala, do not remove knowledge swiftly and take it away swiftly from theslaves, rather, he will take away knowledge by taking away the 'Ulamaa".

Now this Hadith has been narrated by three or more of the companions of the prophet SallaAllah 'Alih wa Sallam, and that is all. It hasn’t been narrated by twenty or ten or fifteen, so ithas been narrated by three or more, but it didn’t reach such a level way, according to thedefinition of motawater. As we said it is an innovated definition, then by that definition, thisHadith is Mashhour; meaning three or more, although it didn’t reach such level, but weabsolutely sure that the prophet Salla Allah 'Alih wa Sallam said it . I reiterate that this is notthe Manhaj, or the method or the methodology of the Muhadethin.

There is a view of the Hanafy scholars where they say that Mashhour is between Ahad andMotawater, and it is not motawater in the tabaqa of the Sahaba. So, they say that this issue

of Mashhour is not mashhour in the way I have just defined it that three or more narrators …until the end of the definition; they say that mashhour, is mashhour because we don’t haveenough companions to classify this Motawater, but after in the tabaqa of tabe'ien, we have somany people and after that is even more and even more. So they say that the mashhour is alevel between Ahad and Motawater.

Now, when it comes to mashhour and 'Aziz and Gharib, these three types of Ahadith, we cannot say that they are authentic or not authentic, we cannot say that this one ismashhour hadith definitely 100% without any doubt is Sahih, nor we can say with certaintyalso that the hadith is Da'ief. Rather a mashhour hadith can have, can include both categories.




Next, the author then says:" " and it is also called a well circulated reportaccording to one opinion. So the opinion here is that (Mustafeid) and(mashhour) are synonyms. And the other opinion is that the Mustafied is that hadith which atthe beginning of, in every single Tabaqa, we have exactly the same number, they don’tincrease or decrease, they are either three, three, three; there are three companions, and three

tabe'ien and so forth until the end of the sanad, that is Mustafied. And even we are going toread in Nkhbatul Fikr, and according to one opinion, or according to the strongest opinion,according to the preferred opinion, then no, there is a disagreement and perhaps, most of thetime we will not have enough time to deal with every single issue in detail, like we said, this

particular book of ours is a book which is concise.

Insha'Allah, we have come to the end of lesson number one. In lesson number twoInsha'Allah, we will continue with the hadith of 'Aziz.

(As'al Allah Subhanaho wa ta'ala) to facilitate your study of this book

Insha'Allah.

May Allah grant us sincerity in everything we do.

Wa Akher Da'wana An Alhamdulillallah Rab Al 'alamin,wa Assalamo 'alaykom wa Rahmato

Allah wa Barakatoh


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