Reply

Submitted by Asma Begum (Canada), Jun 16, 2008 at 21:01

First of all Goldziher didn't prove anything. It was his point of view and he was more an orientalist than a historian.Do you know?
"Goldziher regarded Judaism and Islam as kindred faiths." In Cairo Goldziher even prayed as a Muslim: "In the midst of the thousands of the pious, I rubbed my forehead against the floor of the mosque. Never in my life was I more devout, more truly devout, than on that exalted Friday.
I don't regard Patricia Crone a reliable source.
The fundamental Islamic sources such as the

Qur'an and the core traditions of the Prophet

(peace and blessings be upon him) have been

fully preserved intact. This can be demonstrated

easily by referring to the sound historical

methodologies in verifying the sources.

There is a basic distinction between Islam and

other religions in this regard: Islam is singularly

unique among the world religions in the fact

that in order to preserve the sources of their

religion, the Muslims invented a scientific

methodology based on precise rules for

gathering data and verifying them. As it has

been said, 'Isnad or documentation is part of

Islamic religion, and if it had not been for isnad,

everybody would have said whatever he wanted.'

So, there is no comparison between the

sources of Islam and those of other religions in

this respect, as you will never find anything

comparable to the many sciences Muslims

invented for this noble task of preserving the

sources of Islam. By virtue of such sciences, you

can scrutinize and verify every report in the

sources.

In this context, it should be added that the

process of recording Hadith started as early as

the time of the Prophet (peace and blessings be

upon him). Actually, many Companions recorded

hadiths, and, `Abdullah ibn `Amr, for example,

was permitted and even encouraged by the

Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) to

write down Hadith. In addition, some 50

Companions and many Successors are said to

have possessed manuscripts (sahifah, Arabic

plural suhuf), which was used as a term to

designate compendia of Hadith that emerged

during the century before the formation of the

classical collections. For more elaboration, you

can read about the stages of recording Hadith.
It is said that notable hadith scholars including

Ahmad Ibn Hanbal 855, Ibn Maīn 847, and Ibn

Madīni 848 accepted the authenticity of Bukhari.

Therefore al-Bukhari finished his work around

846, and spent the last twenty-four years of his

life visiting other cities and scholars, teaching

the hadith he had collected. In every city that he

visited, thousands of people would gather in the

main mosque to listen to him recite traditions.

Regarding Western academic doubts as to the

actual date and authorship of the book that

bears his name, Sunni say that notable hadith

scholars of that time, such as Ahmad Ibn Hanbal

(855 CE/241 AH), Ibn Maīn (847 CE/233 AH), and

Ibn Madīni (848 CE/234 AH), all accepted the

authenticity of his book [1] [2]. Thus, the

collections inmediate fame makes arguments

regarding its being changed after the authors

death highly improbable.

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