As Sunnah Is Revelations From God

This is a letter i wrote published in Malaysiakini.

Dear Editor,

In reply to Umran Kadir’s letter,” Hadith not divine revelations”, allow me to express these points:

1. As Sunnah is Revelations from God on the authority of God himself. He states clearly it in the Quran clearly in verses such as 16:44, 02:153,62:02 and many more. To say otherwise is to deny the Quran and God Himself.
2. Umran claims that the hadeeth was only collected 300 years after the demise of the Prophet. This is utterly untrue. In his book entitle “ Studies of Early Hadeeth Literature” , M. Mustafa Al Azami cites abundance evidence of records of hadeeth records that dates back even before the demise of the Prophet.
3. Umran’s claim that scholars differs from each other on the status of a hadeeth is also an exaggeration. The difference of opinion among scholars is never on the content of a hadeeth but rather on the authenticity of the chain of transmission of a certain hadeeth. For a particular hadeeth, there exists more than one chain of transmission that connects the narrator to the Prophet over the course of several generations. A particular hadeeth may have one unauthentic chain but it is still acceptable as there is other authentic chain available.
4. Over the course of history there exist numerous attempts by enemies of Islam to usurp the religion by introducing numerous fabricated al Hadeeth. The scholars of Islam, via a systematic and time and mean tested methodology, strive to stop these attempts at falsifying the religion. Among such attempts is by 19^th century orientalists such as I Goldzeiher and others that tries to question the existence of written records of Al Hadeeth before the time of Al Bukhari and Muslims.
5. The chain of transmission that brought us the hadeeth also brought to us the Al Quran. To reject the hadeeth is another step towards rejecting the Quran.
6. On 02:54, the phrase used is < ….fatubuillahi faq tuluhu….> which clearly means “ …therefore make repent to the lord and therefore kill yourselves…”. The phrase is what is known in the Arabic language as “Feel Amr” or simply an order and it indicates resoluteness and firmness. The wordings in 02:55 and 02:56 are too soft to negate the firmness of the order stated in 02:54. Therefore, in spite of all attempt by Umran, 02:55-56 does not abrogate the order given in 02:54 by Moses on the apostates
7. 02:54 also teaches us that apostasy is a crime and those committing it will have to b punished. Just like those who commit treason, they too have to be punished.

ABDUL RAHMAN ABDUL TALIB

cabearth4@yahoo.ca

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