Islam's Original Texts 6: The Hadith and Sharia — Schools, Sunni & Shia

Thank you for visiting. This article is the sixth installment (the final one) in a series explaining the original texts of Islam.

So far, I have explained the scripture the Qur’an, which is the word of God itself (Article 1), the Six Articles of Faith (Article 2), the Five Pillars of practice (Article 3), the stories of the prophets (Article 4), and the end times and the afterlife (Article 5). In this final installment, I look in detail at the second original text after the Qur’an, the “Hadith,” the Islamic law derived from it, and the various sects.

For an overview map of Islam’s original texts as a whole, please see this summary article.

The Original Texts of Islam — The Qur'an and Hadith: Full Article Indexen.senkohome.com/myths-religions-origins-islam/

What Is the Hadith — the Record of the Prophet’s Words and Deeds

The Qur’an is the word of God itself, but not everything is concretely written there, down to the details of daily life.

For example, prayer, one of the Five Pillars — the Qur’an commands “keep up the prayer,” but it does not record in detail the concrete method, such as how many times a day, with what movements, reciting what. The fine manners of fasting and pilgrimage are the same. So where do Muslims learn that from?

The answer is the “Hadith.” The Hadith is a tradition recording “what the Prophet Muhammad said, did, and approved.” Since Muhammad was the one who best embodied God’s revelation, his very words and deeds become the living model for correctly practicing the Qur’an. In fact, the concrete way Muslims perform prayer is based not on the Qur’an but on Muhammad’s movements as conveyed by the Hadith.

Organizing the relationship of the two gives the following.

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The Sunna — Muhammad’s Model

Closely tied to the Hadith is the word “Sunna.”

The Sunna refers to the very “model way of life and practice of the Prophet Muhammad” conveyed through the Hadith. If the Hadith is “the individual traditions (records),” the Sunna is “the ideal example of Muhammad” that emerges from them.

For a Muslim, following Muhammad’s way of life is an important part of faith. The manners of prayer and fasting of course, but down to how to treat people, the ethics of commerce, and grooming, acting by the standard of “what would the prophet have done” is held to be the ideal. The Qur’an (the word of God) and the Sunna (the prophet’s model) — these two become the two great grounds supporting a Muslim’s faith and law.

What Does the Hadith Tell — from Famous Sayings

Let us savor some well-known examples of what kind of words the Hadith concretely is. Not only legal provisions, but many concise, powerful words teaching the state of the heart have been handed down.

• “Deeds are (judged) only by intentions” — one of the most famous hadiths, placed at the head of al-Bukhari’s collection. It teaches that even the same act changes in meaning by what its motive was
• “None of you truly believes until he wishes for his brother what he wishes for himself” — an Islamic version of the “Golden Rule,” so to speak, teaching consideration for others
• “Seeking knowledge is a duty laid upon every Muslim” — also held to be the spiritual background to the Islamic world’s flowering of learning in the medieval period
• “Paradise lies at the feet of mothers” — words teaching, in a vivid metaphor, the importance of honoring one’s mother

Such words have been memorized, quoted, and have served as a guide for people’s lives for over a thousand years. The Hadith has played the role of translating the Qur’an’s majestic “word of God” into a concrete way of living day by day. Precisely for this reason, as we see next, whether each one is genuine came to be strictly questioned.

The Reliability of the Hadith — the Appraisal of “Who Transmitted It”

Here a great problem arises. After his death, Muhammad’s words and deeds, as they were transmitted from mouth to mouth, swelled to an enormous number, and among them many fabricated, false traditions came to be mixed in. Even false hadiths that the powerful made to suit themselves appeared.

So, to discern which are genuine, a precise “science of Hadith” developed in the Islamic world. The key to that appraisal was the “isnad (the chain of transmission).”

A hadith always has, before its text (Muhammad’s words = the matn), a chain of transmitters (the isnad): “A said, according to what B heard from C…” Scholars thoroughly investigated each person appearing in this chain — whether they really existed, whether they were a reliable person, whether their memory was sound, and whether the chain was unbroken. For this, a “science of evaluating persons,” recording the careers and character appraisals of thousands of transmitters, even developed.

As a result, hadiths are graded according to reliability.

This method of “scientifically verifying information by the route of who transmitted it” is a distinctive learning that Islamic civilization produced, and is said to have influenced the development of historiography as well.

The Six Great Hadith Collections — the Compendium of Reliable Traditions

From the 9th century on, scholars gathered and compiled reliable hadiths that had passed through strict appraisal. What is held to be especially authoritative among Sunnis is the “Six Great Hadith Collections (al-Kutub al-Sitta).”

Among them, the first two — “Sahih al-Bukhari” and “Sahih Muslim” — are called the “two great authentic collections (the Sahihayn),” and are held to have the highest authority after the Qur’an. al-Bukhari is said to have selected only a very small part meeting strict criteria, out of the several hundred thousand traditions he gathered, and his carefulness can be glimpsed in this.

Sharia — Islamic Law

The totality of a Muslim’s way of life, drawn from the Qur’an and the Sunna (Hadith), is “Sharia (Islamic law).”

Sharia is a concept far broader than mere “law.” From religious rituals like prayer and fasting, to marriage, divorce, inheritance, commerce, and punishment, and even to what may be eaten (halal) and what is forbidden (haram), it is held to be “the right way of life that God has decreed,” covering every aspect of life. The original word means “the path leading to the watering place,” with the nuance of something showing the path a person should walk.

So, when a new problem not directly written in the Qur’an or Hadith arises, how is it decided? For this, Islamic jurisprudence uses mainly four sources of law.

When the Qur’an and the Sunna have a direct answer, one follows it; when they do not, a judgment is drawn by the consensus of scholars (ijma) or analogy from existing provisions (qiyas). The learning that performs such legal interpretation is called “fiqh (jurisprudence).”

The Four Great Schools — the Diversity of Interpretation

Even with the same sources of law, there is a range in how they are interpreted. So, within Sunni Islam, four major schools of law (madhhab) developed historically.

What is important is that these schools of law are not “sects” that oppose each other. All acknowledge one another as orthodox Sunni schools, and only which school is mainstream differs by region and era. The same problem may have different fine judgments by school, but that can be called an expression of the flexibility and diversity that Islamic law holds. Note that the Shia, discussed later, have their own “Ja’fari school.”

Sunni and Shia — the Split over the Successor

Finally, let me explain Islam’s two great currents, “Sunni” and “Shia.” The cause of the two splitting was, rather than doctrine itself, the question of “who is Muhammad’s successor.”

In AD 632, the Prophet Muhammad left the world without naming a clear successor. Over who would lead the community (umma), people’s thinking divided into two.

One side thought, “a fitting leading figure chosen by the community may become the successor (caliph).” They chose Muhammad’s companion “Abu Bakr” as the first caliph. This position came to be called “Sunni,” in the sense of those who follow Muhammad’s practice (the Sunna), and is the majority, occupying about 85% of all Muslims today. The following four, up to Umar, Uthman, and Ali, are called the “Rightly Guided Caliphs” by Sunnis, held to be an exemplary age.

The other side thought, “the successor must be one who carries Muhammad’s blood.” The one they regarded as the legitimate successor was Muhammad’s cousin and son-in-law, “Ali.” From the word meaning “the party of Ali,” they came to be called “Shia,” occupying about 15% of Muslims today. They are distributed largely in Iran and Iraq.

Ali later became the fourth caliph, but was assassinated amid strife. Further, that Ali’s son “Husayn” was tragically killed at the Battle of Karbala in 680 became a decisive event for the Shia. The observance mourning this martyrdom is still one of the Shia’s most important religious events.

In Shia Islam, a special leader who carries Muhammad’s blood is called an “Imam,” and is revered as a God-guided, infallible being. The “Twelver Shia,” taking Ali as the first and acknowledging twelve Imams, is the largest current of the Shia.

That said, the difference between the two should not be overemphasized. This is because the foundations of faith — the one God Allah, the scripture the Qur’an, the Prophet Muhammad, and the Six Articles and Five Pillars — are shared by both.

Sufism — the Inner Path

Apart from sects, Islam also has a current that deeply pursues the inner side of faith, “Sufism (Islamic mysticism).”

Sufism aims not only at the outward practice of the law (Sharia), but at directly experiencing love for God and a sense of oneness with God. Through “dhikr,” reciting God’s names again and again, and a distinctive whirling dance, it tries to purify the heart and draw near to God.

Sufism often produced rich culture such as poetry and music, and became a driving force in spreading Islam to various parts of the world. It can be called another deep side of Islamic faith, spreading beyond the frame of Sunni and Shia.

To Learn More

Here are some related books. Reading them alongside this series lets you savor this world even more deeply.

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Conclusion

In this article, I explained in detail the second original text after the Qur’an, the “Hadith,” the Islamic law Sharia, the four great schools, and Sunni, Shia, and Sufism. How was it?

The “Hadith” is the record of the Prophet Muhammad’s words and deeds, and its model, the “Sunna,” was one of Islam’s two great grounds alongside the Qur’an. And I think you can see that a meticulous system of learning was built — the science of Hadith, which strictly appraises traditions by “who transmitted them,” and Sharia, made up of the four sources of law and the four great schools.

With this, all six articles of the Islam original-texts series are complete. From the word of God, the Qur’an, to the Six Articles and Five Pillars, the prophets and the end times, and the Hadith and Islamic law — I hope you have savored deeply the world of Islam’s original texts.

Besides Islam, I also explain the original texts of Christianity (the Bible) and the mythologies of India, Greece, Japan, and more. For the full list, please see the Summary of the World’s Mythology and Religion Original Texts.

World Mythology & Religion: The Original Texts Explained — Complete Indexen.senkohome.com/myths-religions-origins/

I hope you’ll read the next article too.