asa
I did not receive that email in which Mubascher Inayet sahib asked me
for
evidence from the writings of Ghulam Ahmed Pervez that he made grievous
errors in his understanding of Hadith. Now I find it at the tail end of
your
communiction with each other.
Perhaps Inayet sahib thinks that I would be criticizing Allama Pervez
in the
same clueless way in which Mr. Shahid Mahmud and Bashir Abid attack
Maulana
Maudoodi (may Allah fill his grave with light).
Dear Muslims, Pervez sahib's errors were grievous and most of his
attacks
on Hadith go against him. (It seems that Mr. Shahid Mahmud has not
given full
credit to his source for his 'lists' of 'bad' hadith and attacks on
Maulana
Maudoodi: this 'credit' should go to Pervez sahib. Or did Mr. Mahmud
get
these indirectly from Dr. Shabbir who did not admit that he got them
from
GAP?)
(I am using the world 'maulana' deliberately because I think it is a
correct
Islamic term.)
Let us go to IDARA-e-TOLU-e-ISLAM's magnum opus titled MAQAME HADITH
which
has the writings both of GAP and Jayrajpuri, Ubaidullah Sindhi, etc. It
was
published, we are told on the info page, by this group in 1953, 1965,
1975
and 1986 without any change. Thus it signifies an authentic expression
of
Pervezi attack on Hadith.
I could destroy this whole book page by page but let's look at one
important
segment for now. Allama Pervez (may Allah forgive his sins) thought
that Imam
Abu Hanifa gave very little credence to Hadith and in fact was against
Hadith. Pervez sahib uses a couple of quotes from the critics of Abu
Hanifa
to create this impression. Then he makes this interesting point about
Imam
Abu Hanifa:
"He put together FIQH in the light of the book of Allah with his
ijtihad and
thru consultation with ahl ar-ray (opinion makers).After that if
someone said
that your decision is against the hadith of the messenger of Allah, he
would
reply as hazrat 'Umar used to reply that the messenger of Allah's
decision
was for that time - now conditions have changed - hence that decision
must be
changed, or he (Abu Hanifa)
following hazrat 'Ayesha and other sahaba would say: who knows what the
messenger of Allah said and what the listener thought he said. In the
presence of the book of Allah, we cannot make such things which lack
surety
part of religion, because he (Abu Hanifa) wanted to make this fact very
clear
that the hadith of the messenger of Allah are neither based on surety
nor are
they unchanged. Hence sometimes he would, in his rejection of Hadith,
adopt
severe attitudes." (Maqame Hadith, p.159)
It seems to me that Allama Pervez knew very little about Imam Abu
Hanifa.
Also, he was for some reason ignoring the fact that there is a
difference
between CRITICISM OF HADITH and REJECTION OF HADITH. All those scholars
who
see Hadith as essential to Qur'anic understanding have looked
critically at
Hadith. Hazrat 'Umar and hazrat 'Ayesha did not criticize Hadith to
condemn
Hadith as such but TO MAKE SURE THAT THE HADITH WAS AUTHENTIC NARRATION
OF
THE PROPET (pbuh).
Allama Pervez does not let his readers know that Imam Abu Hanifa, being
a
very influential scholar, was also criticized by his contemporaries
who
wanted to discredit him by saying that he did not accept Hadith as
source of
law. Pervez sahib should have pointed out what Abu Hanifa said in
response to
his critics: {Notice how Abu Hanifa puts his own analogical reasoning
way
beyond the Prophet's teachings and even those of the
khulafa-e-rashidoon.)
Caliph Mansoor had written to Abu Hanifa: "I have heard that you prefer
QIYAS (analogical reasoning) to Hadith." Here is his reply:
"The information which has reached you is not correct. I first take the
Book
of Allah, then the Sunnah of the messenger of Allah, pbuh, then the
decisions
of Abu Bakr, 'Umar, Usman and Ali, then of those of the rest of the
sahaba.
But if there is difference of opinion among the sahaba, then I use
QIYAS."
(Mizane Shairani vol.1, p.62)
In his TARIKH (History) of Baghdad, Khatib, quotes Imam Abu Hanifa as
follows:
"When I find a command in the Book of Allah, I grasp it. If I do not
find it
there, I take the Sunnah of the messenger of Allah and those of his
narrations which have been transmitted by reliable people to reliable
people.
If I do not find a command in either the Book of Allah or the Sunnah of
the
messenger of Allah, then I follow the words of the companions (sahaba)
of the
messenger of Allah, and in those matters where they differ, I accept
the
words of the sahabi I want to and reject the one I don't want. But I do
not
accept the words of anyone other than these as decisive. As for other
people,
I have as much of a right to ijtihad as they have." (Tarikhe Baghdad,
vol.13,
p.368)
{These classical writings are now available in the Urdu language in
full or
in part.}
Notice how way OFF Pervez sahib was? Where Abu Hanifa has Qur'an and
authentic sunnah, Abu Hanifa sticks to it.
A wider study of the great work and scholarship of Imam Abu Hanifa
indicates
that the Pervezi idea of Imam Abu Hanifa just sticking to a handful of
Hadith
and rejecting Hadith by and large is simply ABSURD.
Not only did Abu Hanifa cherish and value hadith, he taught them to his
numerous students. Take his outstanding student, Imam Abu Yousuf: He
collected more than 1000 Hadith which Imam Abu Hanifa had taught him
and
compiled them in a book titled KITAB al-ATHAR. There are other
collections of
Hadith which Abu Hanifa collected with great care. I have one of these
in my
library. It is titled MUSNAD Abi Hanifa.
Abu Hanifa's collections of Hadith are a serious blow for the attack by
Jewish writers (Goldziher, Schact, etc.) that Hadith was collected
(invented?) in the third century! Imam Abu Hanifa was born in 80 Hijri
and
died in Hijri 150.
I wonder why Allama Pervez did not read Egyptian scholar Muhammad Abu
Zahra's
famous book on Imam Abu Hanifa titled Hayat Imam Abu Hanifa. Or at
least
Pervez sahib's followers should have revised MAQAME HADITH in the light
of
Abu Zahra's book whose Urdu translation by Prof. Ghulam Ahmed Hariri
reached
its THIRD EDITION in 1983.
Abu Zahra shows in detail that Imam Abu Hanifa not only decided by
Hadith
(above QIYAS) but even took NUMEROUS MURSAL Hadith. Mursal Hadith are
considered WEAK by strict scholars of Hadith, such as Imam Bukhari,
because
they leave out the name of the sahabi through whom the hadith reached
the
Tabai (generation after the sahaba). Abu Zahra quotes a number of these
MURSAL hadith which are found in Imam Abu Hanifa's works. Thus Abu
Hanifa
used mursal Hadith in his fiqhi decisions!
(The Tabai scholars were meticulous in collection of hadith but even
they do
not compare with Imam Bukhari. If a hadith is mursal, it does not mean
that
it is unauthentic or fabricated. It simply is not as carefully
documented as
those with complete chains of narration.)
{Here we are dealing with a level of scholarship which if applied to
modern
research works and narrations of other religions would empty out the
world's
libraries as UNRELIABLE.)
I have much more info on Imam Abu Hanifa and hadith and Pervez sahib's
errors
but I will say to Mubascher sahib and Abid sahib, etc: A word to the
wise is
enough.
Sincerely
Kaukab Siddique
a humble servant of Allah
in the caravan of those
who love the words of
Muhammad (pbuh) as the
best commentary on the
Qur'an.
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2002-03-08 Fri 16:41ct