The truth is in the facts

Submitted by Alain Jean-Mairet (Switzerland), Oct 10, 2013 at 23:48

Actually, over 95pc of traditions were declared faked by the authors of the most respected collections (Bukhari, Muslim) – they only kept a few thousands of them, they say themselves, out of several hundred thousand.

Actually, no-one seems to have written anything about the "many miracles" of the prophet (or, for that matter, Islam, Muslim, Muhammad or Mecca), until some 50 years after his supposed death. And most of it was recollected only centuries later. It is like the more time passed, the more details were known.

Actually, the only "record" we have of that period thus comes from believers and storytellers, who lived at least decades after the fact, and whose production was highly unreliable even in the eyes of their most famous collectors. And that includes the Koran: we have not a trace yet of Othman's Koran: today, we know that all manuscripts kept in museums and presented as such were written decades after Othman's supposed death.

As for the content of those scriptures, for example, if Muhammad is supposed to have said not to kill women or children, he is also supposed to have ordered not to bother. And this "exception" figures on the very same pages of the very same collections of hadiths, so that all conscientious Muslims will know it:

http://www.usc.edu/org/cmje/religious-texts/hadith/bukhari/052-sbt.php

Volume 4, Book 52, Number 256:

Narrated As-Sab bin Jaththama:

The Prophet passed by me at a place called Al-Abwa or Waddan, and was asked whether it was permissible to attack the pagan warriors at night with the probability of exposing their women and children to danger. The Prophet replied, « They (i.e. women and children) are from them (i.e. pagans). » I also heard the Prophet saying, « The institution of Hima is invalid except for Allah and His Apostle. »

http://www.usc.edu/org/cmje/religious-texts/hadith/muslim/019-smt.php

Book 019, Number 4321:

It is reported on the authority of Sa'b b. Jaththama that the Prophet of Allah (may peace be upon him), when asked about the women and children of the polytheists being killed during the night raid, said: They are from them.

In order to know the unequivocal meaning of those scriptures, the best is to study the consensus of jurists over time. When they agree on something, without discording voices, I think we can take for granted that the case is very well grounded in the scriptures. This is tedious work of course, but they are good clues from Averroes, who actually did just that in

The Distinguished Jurist's Primer: Bidayat al-Mujtahid Wa Nihayat al-Muqtasid (Great Books of Islamic Civilization). 2 volumes. Garnet Publishing Ltd.

http://www.amazon.com/Distinguished-Jurists-Primer-I/dp/1859641385

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