Established Sunnah: Some Technical Questions
This is a set of some helpful technical questions on the concept of Established Sunnah. The questions are in bold and the answers are in normal font:
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Salam alaykum
I’m a self-taught student of Islamic studies. For the past one or two years, I have extensively gone through the books and views of Javed Ahmad Ghamidi and his associates like Dr Shehzad Saleem and you too, especially on the concept of the Mutawātir Sunnah. I have also found in my study that this concept of the Mutawātir Sunnah is approved by even the earliest scholars of Islam, such as Abū Yūsuf al-Anṣārī and others.
I have some doubts though.
Alaykum Assalam
I am happy to help but please note, as I also wrote in About the Author, I am not an associate of Javed Ahmad Ghamidi. I of course had the privilege to learn a lot from this great scholar of our time and I can never thank him enough for that. However my views are not representing Mr. Ghamidi’s views. I agree with many of his views but at the same time I look at religion and Islam from a fundamentally different paradigm that results in some major differences in understanding religion, and Islam in particular. In answering your questions I am sharing with you my views not his.
I will first share with you my understanding of the concept as this will make it easier to answer your specific questions:
Although in theory all scholars have appreciated the concept of sunnah, in practice most of the traditional scholars look at hadith as the sunnah or as the most obvious source of sunnah. This then resulted in practically ignoring or forgetting a much more reliable source of information, compared to hadith.
This more reliable source of information can be best appreciated by answering the following question: “How did you learn how to pray?”. Note, I am not asking about details or specifics that may differ among different Muslim groups. I am asking about the outline and the main components of prayer on which all Muslims agree, e.g. number of prayers per day, number of units of each prayer (rak’ah), number of ruku’ (bow) and sajdah (prostration) in each prayer, recitation of al-Fatiha, … .
Obviously the Qur’an does not teach us how and I am yet to come across an individual who would say he/she learned it from hadith. Normally the answer is, I learned it from my parents/teacher/Imam of mosque, etc. If you could trace this back by asking this question from the person from whom you learned how to pray and then from the person who taught that person, etc. you will end up with the generation who witnessed the prophet (pbuh) or in fact the prophet (pbuh) himself.
So here we are seeing a source of understanding Islamic practices that is not the Qur’an and is not hadith either. That is the historically perpetual agreed upon religious practices of Muslims that is originated from the generation of people who witnessed the prophet (pbuh). This I argue is what is really the content of Sunnah. It is clearly distinguished from hadith in terms of form, content and transfer:
- Form: it is a practice not a documented narrative
- Content: it is about obligatory or recommended religious practices not a variety of topics
- Transfer; It is different from hadith in terms of transfer in several dimensions:
This is where I agree with Javed Ahmad Ghamidi that the Sunnah, as defined above, is different and much more reliable than hadith and that its reliability is the same or close to the reliability of the Qur’an. As you know Javed Ahmad Ghamidi then goes on to define some criteria for identifying the Sunnah and to actually list what the content of the Sunnah is. Here too I agree with him. However where I slightly differ is that I do not see the criteria for identifying the Sunnah and the list of the Sunnah to be like a concrete, as if written on the stone, not debatable. I do see that there can be areas of doubt and areas for debate. I however still believe that the Sunnah, with all possible doubts about some of its details, is a tremendously more reliable source of understanding the religious practices when comparing to what is deemed as authentic hadith. I therefore consider Sunnah with this definition and scope to be at the same or nearly the same level as the Qur’an in terms of sources of understanding Islam. Any other valuable source, including hadith, depends on these two sources and should be verified and interpreted according to these two sources.
When it comes to Sunnah I am more thinking of its practical use for individuals rather than its theoretical formulation for scholarly purposes. As an individual I am interested to follow those religious practices that I am sure or nearly sure that I must follow as a Muslim. For this, I need an evidence, a hujjah. That evidence comes easier from Sunnah rather than hadith. I find it very difficult to argue that for instance reading maghrib prayer in three units (rak’ah) is a wrong Sunnah. I found it difficult to argue that perhaps sometime in the history of Muslims the maghrib prayer was four rak’ah and then suddenly due to a systematic confusion all Muslims started to read it in three rak’ah.
Comparing to the above example, I find it very easy to argue that a religious practice that is narrated in an authentic hadith, is not the duty of all Muslims, and is simply a recommendation or just a religious practice that the prophet (pbuh) personally liked to do or is simply one form of several forms of practice reported about the prophet (pbuh).
Disregard of any scholarly theoretical debates about this definition of Sunnah, I argue that for an individual this concept of Sunnah is much more reliable (hujjah) than hadith.
With the above in perspective, I now proceed to answer your specific questions:
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1. One of the principles to identify a (Mutawātir) Sunnah that Ghamidi and his associates like Dr Shehzad Saleem often state—esp. when it comes to beard—is that a Sunnah has to be something religious in nature (the First Principle). Right?
But this seems to be like a rather CIRCULAR and SUBJECTIVE argument to me!
Because if we can know—without divine or prophetic guidance—what can be termed religious and what not then we wouldn’t need any divine books or prophets in the first place!
Also, one can even use the same argument and say that shaving the pubes, or celebrating the Two Eids, or trimming the moustache, or taking a bath (ghusl) after “janābah”—all of which are deemed Mutawātir Sunnahs by Ghamidi and his associates—are not religious in nature at all as many Qur’ān-only Muslims do!
So can you explain that?
One more example is that both being circumcised and uncircumcised are considered normal and accepted for men just like both having a beard and being clean-shaven are considered normal and accepted.
So WHY being circumcised constitutes a Sunnah but not having a beard?
Please note that the question here is related to the CIRCULARITY (PETITIO PRINCIPII) and the SUBJECTIVITY of your principle.
Perhaps you now appreciate that this is not ‘my’ principle. It is Javed Ahmad Ghamidi’s principle. I do consider it to be a helpful (although not necessarily a clear cut) principle. Also, since you are quoting Javed Ahamd Ghamidi, just to make sure we do justice to quoting him, what he writes in his book (translation) is: "Only that thing can be a Sunnah which is religious by nature and status".
We do know that in Abrahamic religious physical purification was always considered as important as spiritual purification. Almost all the examples that you put in your question are related to physical purification, these are: shaving the pubes, trimming the moustache, taking a bath (ghusl) after “janābah and being circumcised. These can be called religious by status. The only example in your question that is not about physical purification is the celebrating of the two Eids. This one is even easier to appreciate because the two Eids are associated with the very important religious acts of fasting and hajj. These Eids are religious by nature.
Now when it comes to having beard, firstly it has nothing to do with physical purification (in fact one may argue that not having it is better for cleanness). Second, it is also not associated with any other religious acts. This seems to be the reason that not all scholars of Islam considered beard to be part of the Sunnah and some of them (as their photos and pictures show) do/did not have beard themselves. This is while I am not aware of any scholars of Islam who would disagree that the above hygiene practices or the celebration of Eids are part of the Sunnah.
So as you hopefully see, there is a recognisable difference between having beard and those examples that you referred to.
I however do appreciate the point that you are making. That is, there can be uncertainties here. One may argue that beard does have religious significance just as one may argue that circumcision does not have religious significance. However here comes what I wrote above about the practical rather than the scholarly use of the concept of Sunnah. From practical perspective I think with the definition of Sunnah that is provided above, and with the criteria that are defined and you referred to, the content of the Sunnah will be nearly the same according to all Muslims.
There can be or will be very minor differences and disagreements but these can be taken care of at the individual level. For example if a Muslim believes that there is a convincing evidence that beard has a religious significance, then it will become obligatory for him to consider this as a Sunnah and to let his beard grow. This I would agree will be that part of the Sunnah that may be seen by an individual in the grey area rather than clear area. I however argue that if we fully appreciate and apply the above definition of Sunnah and its criteria then this grey area will be very thin. This is while if you replace Sunnah with hadith, then this grey area will become extensively large. Also note, for many Muslims, the fact that a practice is in the grey area is enough to convince them that they do not have any religious duties (taklif) with regard to that practice, since they believe taklif only comes from indisputable evidence.
If you see it from the above practical perspective then maybe you agree with me that there is no Petitio Princippi here. For the vast majority of what can be called as Sunnah, this does not even apply and for that tiny grey area that this question may apply, the answer is: the perceived circularity can be broken by individual’s perception of existence or non-existence of an evidence (hujjah).
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2. You said:
“The Established [Mutawātir] Sunnah has been passed to us through the consensus [ijmāՙ] of generations. This means all the content of the Established Sunnah is agreed upon by all Ummah. This however does not mean that whatever the Ummah agrees on is necessarily part of the Sunnah. There are things that the Ummah may agree on and they may be good things but these things may not be necessarily part of the Sunnah.”
If this is so then HOW is one supposed to know or determine what exactly constitutes the Established (Mutawātir) Sunnah and what not?
Because, as you might know, there are (and have been) many FALSE CLAIMS of consensus (ijmāՙ) by a number of Muslim scholars of the past and the present on a number of issues!
So do you even have any DEFINITE and CONCLUSIVE criterion in this regard or are these rules of yours meant to be theoretical apologetics only?
Before I answer the question (which I think I have already answered) I need to bring some order to this dialogue:
“Do you believe there is a definite and conclusive criteria to determine what among the practices of Muslims is Sunnah and what is not?”
I try to answer the above reformulated question here:
I don’t think there is a definite and conclusive criteria in the theoretical level but I think there is a very strong criteria in the theoretical level that for an individual can be definite and conclusive in a practical level. I have already explained this with the example of beard.
Please also note, claims of consensus by scholars is one thing, and a practice that is done by all Muslims all through history (as far as we can say) is another thing. This is why I do not like to use the word ijma’ for this concept of Sunnah. It is about what all Muslims have been doing, rather than what scholars have ijma’ on.
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3. Do Ghamidi and his associates—including you—make any difference between uninterrupted transmission (tawātur) and consensus (ijmāՙ), or do they use these terms interchangeably? Please state the differences if any.
Again I am not an associate of Mr. Ghamidi, but I will answer this anyway:
- Tawatur is normally used for hadith. Ijma’ is a fiqhi (related to jurisprudence) terminology.
- Sunnah, as defined here, has nothing to do with hadith and fiqh. It is about shari’ah.
I am sure you already know this, but for the benefit of other readers:
In their own meaning disregard of context, tawatur relates to what is considered as satisfactory number of narrators in each generation through which the narration has come through before it was safely recorded. Ijma’ relates to the agreement of specific group of people (normally scholars). Tawatur does not necessarily mean ‘everyone agreed’ while ijma’ does not necessarily mean ‘in every generation there was agreement’.
If you want to use these words for Sunnah, then you may say that Sunnah is the result of the tawatur of ijma of Muslims, meaning, all Muslims agreed on something (ijma) and this was in every generation (tawatur). If we argue that tawatur should mean everyone, then you may simply say that Sunnah is the religious practices of Muslims originated from the prophet (pbuh) that reached us by tawatur. However as I wrote I prefer to avoid using these terminologies for Sunnah as they can make the matters more confusing.
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4. Ghamidi and his associates state that the common factor that renders both the Qur’ān and the Mutawātir Sunnah historically certain is tawātur and ijmāՙ.
Even you wrote: “This means all the content of the Established Sunnah is agreed upon by all Ummah.” and “First, please bear in mind that there is in fact not a full agreement on the obligation of having beard. Most scholars consider it an obligation while some consider it desirable and a minority consider it optional.”
If this is so then there is NO “full agreement” even as to what constitutes the Qur’ān and what not because some Muslim scholars hold that بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم at the beginning of Sūrah al-Fātiḥah is not a part of it whereas other scholars hold it is! Please note that I’m not talking about merely the recitation or numbering of it here. And please don’t tell me there is no such disagreement among the scholars, because I very well know there is!
Let me first make your argument stronger. I don’t think the example of bismillah that you provided does justice to your argument. You can give much stronger examples. You can refer to the so called seven wordings (ahruf) of the Qur’an, some of the hadiths that suggest a chapter of the Qur’an was longer than what it is now and some scholarly arguments about placement of verses in the chapters of the Qur’an.
I appreciate what you are saying. However remember what I wrote at the start of this writing that it is the practical benefit of the criteria that matters here. As human beings who want to follow a religion we have to follow the strongest sources of evidence that we have. The Qur’an and the Sunnah are the strongest available sources of evidence for us (along with rationality, although some may argue that this is a tool rather than evidence). For some Muslims these sources of evidence are definite. For others these are close enough to definite. What matters is that these more reliable sources should be the base and less reliable sources (like hadith) should be verified and interpreted according to this base.
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5. Also, Ghamidi states: “In the opinion of the author (ref. 1), the Bismillah verse, though a part of the Qur'an, is not part of any Qur'anic Surah including Surah Fatihah. It is addressed to the Prophet Muhammad (sws) with the indication that he is required to read out before his addressees the surah that follows these words.”
http://www.al-mawrid.org/index.php/articles/view/surah-fatihah
If Ghamidi and classical scholars can debate whether a particular verse is a part of the Qur’ān or not then WHY can the Qur’ān-only scholars like Rashad Khalifa and Edip Yuksel not have the right to, and even be right to, claim that the last two verses of Sūrah al-Tawbah (9:128–9) are not part of the Qur’ān?
I have no intentions to defend Mr. Ghamidi or to write against Rashad Khalifa here. However please note the significant difference between the two views:
Ghamidi considers the verse of bismillah to be divine, as you also quoted from him, but does not consider it to be part of the Qur’an. This reminds me of what we read about Ibn Mas’ud’s view on the last two chapters (Falaq, Nas) of the Qur’an. He used to argue that these chapters were simply prayers revealed to the prophet (pbuh) and should not be part of the Qur’an.
Now compare this with the view of Rashad Khalifa about the last two verses of the chapter of Tawbah. He argues that these were two false verses that were added by two scribes nineteen years after the death of the prophet.
So the difference is between considering something divine but not part of the Qur’an as opposed to considering something to be a fabrication that was added to the Qur’an later.
Thanks for your good questions and hope this helped.
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Related Topics:
- Proof of Sunnah
- Sunnah vs. Hadith
- Sunnah vs. Hadith (Follow Up 1: Imitating the Prophet - pbuh)
- Sunnah vs. Hadith (Follow Up 2: Criteria for Accepting a Hadith)
- Sunnah vs. Hadith (Follow Up 3: Definition of Established Sunnah)
- Sunnah vs. Hadith (Follow Up 4: Beard)
- Sunnah vs. Hadith (follow up 5)
- Sunnah Vs. Hadith Follow Up Discussion
- Differences of views about what is Sunnah
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Farhad Shafti
September 2018
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Salam alaykum
I’m a self-taught student of Islamic studies. For the past one or two years, I have extensively gone through the books and views of Javed Ahmad Ghamidi and his associates like Dr Shehzad Saleem and you too, especially on the concept of the Mutawātir Sunnah. I have also found in my study that this concept of the Mutawātir Sunnah is approved by even the earliest scholars of Islam, such as Abū Yūsuf al-Anṣārī and others.
I have some doubts though.
Alaykum Assalam
I am happy to help but please note, as I also wrote in About the Author, I am not an associate of Javed Ahmad Ghamidi. I of course had the privilege to learn a lot from this great scholar of our time and I can never thank him enough for that. However my views are not representing Mr. Ghamidi’s views. I agree with many of his views but at the same time I look at religion and Islam from a fundamentally different paradigm that results in some major differences in understanding religion, and Islam in particular. In answering your questions I am sharing with you my views not his.
I will first share with you my understanding of the concept as this will make it easier to answer your specific questions:
Although in theory all scholars have appreciated the concept of sunnah, in practice most of the traditional scholars look at hadith as the sunnah or as the most obvious source of sunnah. This then resulted in practically ignoring or forgetting a much more reliable source of information, compared to hadith.
This more reliable source of information can be best appreciated by answering the following question: “How did you learn how to pray?”. Note, I am not asking about details or specifics that may differ among different Muslim groups. I am asking about the outline and the main components of prayer on which all Muslims agree, e.g. number of prayers per day, number of units of each prayer (rak’ah), number of ruku’ (bow) and sajdah (prostration) in each prayer, recitation of al-Fatiha, … .
Obviously the Qur’an does not teach us how and I am yet to come across an individual who would say he/she learned it from hadith. Normally the answer is, I learned it from my parents/teacher/Imam of mosque, etc. If you could trace this back by asking this question from the person from whom you learned how to pray and then from the person who taught that person, etc. you will end up with the generation who witnessed the prophet (pbuh) or in fact the prophet (pbuh) himself.
So here we are seeing a source of understanding Islamic practices that is not the Qur’an and is not hadith either. That is the historically perpetual agreed upon religious practices of Muslims that is originated from the generation of people who witnessed the prophet (pbuh). This I argue is what is really the content of Sunnah. It is clearly distinguished from hadith in terms of form, content and transfer:
- Form: it is a practice not a documented narrative
- Content: it is about obligatory or recommended religious practices not a variety of topics
- Transfer; It is different from hadith in terms of transfer in several dimensions:
- It is transferred by doing it rather than narrating it
- It is transferred by all who follow the traditional form of the shari’ah of Islam not few or sometimes one person in each generation
- Its transfer is assumed to be (or should be) uninterrupted from the start to the present
- It is transferred by all who adhered to the Qur’an
- Its transfer was uninterrupted
This is where I agree with Javed Ahmad Ghamidi that the Sunnah, as defined above, is different and much more reliable than hadith and that its reliability is the same or close to the reliability of the Qur’an. As you know Javed Ahmad Ghamidi then goes on to define some criteria for identifying the Sunnah and to actually list what the content of the Sunnah is. Here too I agree with him. However where I slightly differ is that I do not see the criteria for identifying the Sunnah and the list of the Sunnah to be like a concrete, as if written on the stone, not debatable. I do see that there can be areas of doubt and areas for debate. I however still believe that the Sunnah, with all possible doubts about some of its details, is a tremendously more reliable source of understanding the religious practices when comparing to what is deemed as authentic hadith. I therefore consider Sunnah with this definition and scope to be at the same or nearly the same level as the Qur’an in terms of sources of understanding Islam. Any other valuable source, including hadith, depends on these two sources and should be verified and interpreted according to these two sources.
When it comes to Sunnah I am more thinking of its practical use for individuals rather than its theoretical formulation for scholarly purposes. As an individual I am interested to follow those religious practices that I am sure or nearly sure that I must follow as a Muslim. For this, I need an evidence, a hujjah. That evidence comes easier from Sunnah rather than hadith. I find it very difficult to argue that for instance reading maghrib prayer in three units (rak’ah) is a wrong Sunnah. I found it difficult to argue that perhaps sometime in the history of Muslims the maghrib prayer was four rak’ah and then suddenly due to a systematic confusion all Muslims started to read it in three rak’ah.
Comparing to the above example, I find it very easy to argue that a religious practice that is narrated in an authentic hadith, is not the duty of all Muslims, and is simply a recommendation or just a religious practice that the prophet (pbuh) personally liked to do or is simply one form of several forms of practice reported about the prophet (pbuh).
Disregard of any scholarly theoretical debates about this definition of Sunnah, I argue that for an individual this concept of Sunnah is much more reliable (hujjah) than hadith.
With the above in perspective, I now proceed to answer your specific questions:
------------------------
1. One of the principles to identify a (Mutawātir) Sunnah that Ghamidi and his associates like Dr Shehzad Saleem often state—esp. when it comes to beard—is that a Sunnah has to be something religious in nature (the First Principle). Right?
But this seems to be like a rather CIRCULAR and SUBJECTIVE argument to me!
Because if we can know—without divine or prophetic guidance—what can be termed religious and what not then we wouldn’t need any divine books or prophets in the first place!
Also, one can even use the same argument and say that shaving the pubes, or celebrating the Two Eids, or trimming the moustache, or taking a bath (ghusl) after “janābah”—all of which are deemed Mutawātir Sunnahs by Ghamidi and his associates—are not religious in nature at all as many Qur’ān-only Muslims do!
So can you explain that?
One more example is that both being circumcised and uncircumcised are considered normal and accepted for men just like both having a beard and being clean-shaven are considered normal and accepted.
So WHY being circumcised constitutes a Sunnah but not having a beard?
Please note that the question here is related to the CIRCULARITY (PETITIO PRINCIPII) and the SUBJECTIVITY of your principle.
Perhaps you now appreciate that this is not ‘my’ principle. It is Javed Ahmad Ghamidi’s principle. I do consider it to be a helpful (although not necessarily a clear cut) principle. Also, since you are quoting Javed Ahamd Ghamidi, just to make sure we do justice to quoting him, what he writes in his book (translation) is: "Only that thing can be a Sunnah which is religious by nature and status".
We do know that in Abrahamic religious physical purification was always considered as important as spiritual purification. Almost all the examples that you put in your question are related to physical purification, these are: shaving the pubes, trimming the moustache, taking a bath (ghusl) after “janābah and being circumcised. These can be called religious by status. The only example in your question that is not about physical purification is the celebrating of the two Eids. This one is even easier to appreciate because the two Eids are associated with the very important religious acts of fasting and hajj. These Eids are religious by nature.
Now when it comes to having beard, firstly it has nothing to do with physical purification (in fact one may argue that not having it is better for cleanness). Second, it is also not associated with any other religious acts. This seems to be the reason that not all scholars of Islam considered beard to be part of the Sunnah and some of them (as their photos and pictures show) do/did not have beard themselves. This is while I am not aware of any scholars of Islam who would disagree that the above hygiene practices or the celebration of Eids are part of the Sunnah.
So as you hopefully see, there is a recognisable difference between having beard and those examples that you referred to.
I however do appreciate the point that you are making. That is, there can be uncertainties here. One may argue that beard does have religious significance just as one may argue that circumcision does not have religious significance. However here comes what I wrote above about the practical rather than the scholarly use of the concept of Sunnah. From practical perspective I think with the definition of Sunnah that is provided above, and with the criteria that are defined and you referred to, the content of the Sunnah will be nearly the same according to all Muslims.
There can be or will be very minor differences and disagreements but these can be taken care of at the individual level. For example if a Muslim believes that there is a convincing evidence that beard has a religious significance, then it will become obligatory for him to consider this as a Sunnah and to let his beard grow. This I would agree will be that part of the Sunnah that may be seen by an individual in the grey area rather than clear area. I however argue that if we fully appreciate and apply the above definition of Sunnah and its criteria then this grey area will be very thin. This is while if you replace Sunnah with hadith, then this grey area will become extensively large. Also note, for many Muslims, the fact that a practice is in the grey area is enough to convince them that they do not have any religious duties (taklif) with regard to that practice, since they believe taklif only comes from indisputable evidence.
If you see it from the above practical perspective then maybe you agree with me that there is no Petitio Princippi here. For the vast majority of what can be called as Sunnah, this does not even apply and for that tiny grey area that this question may apply, the answer is: the perceived circularity can be broken by individual’s perception of existence or non-existence of an evidence (hujjah).
-----------------
2. You said:
“The Established [Mutawātir] Sunnah has been passed to us through the consensus [ijmāՙ] of generations. This means all the content of the Established Sunnah is agreed upon by all Ummah. This however does not mean that whatever the Ummah agrees on is necessarily part of the Sunnah. There are things that the Ummah may agree on and they may be good things but these things may not be necessarily part of the Sunnah.”
If this is so then HOW is one supposed to know or determine what exactly constitutes the Established (Mutawātir) Sunnah and what not?
Because, as you might know, there are (and have been) many FALSE CLAIMS of consensus (ijmāՙ) by a number of Muslim scholars of the past and the present on a number of issues!
So do you even have any DEFINITE and CONCLUSIVE criterion in this regard or are these rules of yours meant to be theoretical apologetics only?
Before I answer the question (which I think I have already answered) I need to bring some order to this dialogue:
- You quoted from me about Sunnah, however in what you quoted from me the words ‘Mutawatir’ and ‘ijma’ are added. Just a clarification for the readers that these are your words not mine. I prefer not to use these words because they can easily be confused with the usage of these words in hadith and fiqh (jurisprudence).
- I always think that by avoiding unnecessary rhetoric expressions we will be able to communicate much clearer and we also give a fair chance of thinking to our readers. Therefore I reword your last sentence as follows:
“Do you believe there is a definite and conclusive criteria to determine what among the practices of Muslims is Sunnah and what is not?”
I try to answer the above reformulated question here:
I don’t think there is a definite and conclusive criteria in the theoretical level but I think there is a very strong criteria in the theoretical level that for an individual can be definite and conclusive in a practical level. I have already explained this with the example of beard.
Please also note, claims of consensus by scholars is one thing, and a practice that is done by all Muslims all through history (as far as we can say) is another thing. This is why I do not like to use the word ijma’ for this concept of Sunnah. It is about what all Muslims have been doing, rather than what scholars have ijma’ on.
-------------------------
3. Do Ghamidi and his associates—including you—make any difference between uninterrupted transmission (tawātur) and consensus (ijmāՙ), or do they use these terms interchangeably? Please state the differences if any.
Again I am not an associate of Mr. Ghamidi, but I will answer this anyway:
- Tawatur is normally used for hadith. Ijma’ is a fiqhi (related to jurisprudence) terminology.
- Sunnah, as defined here, has nothing to do with hadith and fiqh. It is about shari’ah.
I am sure you already know this, but for the benefit of other readers:
In their own meaning disregard of context, tawatur relates to what is considered as satisfactory number of narrators in each generation through which the narration has come through before it was safely recorded. Ijma’ relates to the agreement of specific group of people (normally scholars). Tawatur does not necessarily mean ‘everyone agreed’ while ijma’ does not necessarily mean ‘in every generation there was agreement’.
If you want to use these words for Sunnah, then you may say that Sunnah is the result of the tawatur of ijma of Muslims, meaning, all Muslims agreed on something (ijma) and this was in every generation (tawatur). If we argue that tawatur should mean everyone, then you may simply say that Sunnah is the religious practices of Muslims originated from the prophet (pbuh) that reached us by tawatur. However as I wrote I prefer to avoid using these terminologies for Sunnah as they can make the matters more confusing.
------------------
4. Ghamidi and his associates state that the common factor that renders both the Qur’ān and the Mutawātir Sunnah historically certain is tawātur and ijmāՙ.
Even you wrote: “This means all the content of the Established Sunnah is agreed upon by all Ummah.” and “First, please bear in mind that there is in fact not a full agreement on the obligation of having beard. Most scholars consider it an obligation while some consider it desirable and a minority consider it optional.”
If this is so then there is NO “full agreement” even as to what constitutes the Qur’ān and what not because some Muslim scholars hold that بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم at the beginning of Sūrah al-Fātiḥah is not a part of it whereas other scholars hold it is! Please note that I’m not talking about merely the recitation or numbering of it here. And please don’t tell me there is no such disagreement among the scholars, because I very well know there is!
Let me first make your argument stronger. I don’t think the example of bismillah that you provided does justice to your argument. You can give much stronger examples. You can refer to the so called seven wordings (ahruf) of the Qur’an, some of the hadiths that suggest a chapter of the Qur’an was longer than what it is now and some scholarly arguments about placement of verses in the chapters of the Qur’an.
I appreciate what you are saying. However remember what I wrote at the start of this writing that it is the practical benefit of the criteria that matters here. As human beings who want to follow a religion we have to follow the strongest sources of evidence that we have. The Qur’an and the Sunnah are the strongest available sources of evidence for us (along with rationality, although some may argue that this is a tool rather than evidence). For some Muslims these sources of evidence are definite. For others these are close enough to definite. What matters is that these more reliable sources should be the base and less reliable sources (like hadith) should be verified and interpreted according to this base.
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5. Also, Ghamidi states: “In the opinion of the author (ref. 1), the Bismillah verse, though a part of the Qur'an, is not part of any Qur'anic Surah including Surah Fatihah. It is addressed to the Prophet Muhammad (sws) with the indication that he is required to read out before his addressees the surah that follows these words.”
http://www.al-mawrid.org/index.php/articles/view/surah-fatihah
If Ghamidi and classical scholars can debate whether a particular verse is a part of the Qur’ān or not then WHY can the Qur’ān-only scholars like Rashad Khalifa and Edip Yuksel not have the right to, and even be right to, claim that the last two verses of Sūrah al-Tawbah (9:128–9) are not part of the Qur’ān?
I have no intentions to defend Mr. Ghamidi or to write against Rashad Khalifa here. However please note the significant difference between the two views:
Ghamidi considers the verse of bismillah to be divine, as you also quoted from him, but does not consider it to be part of the Qur’an. This reminds me of what we read about Ibn Mas’ud’s view on the last two chapters (Falaq, Nas) of the Qur’an. He used to argue that these chapters were simply prayers revealed to the prophet (pbuh) and should not be part of the Qur’an.
Now compare this with the view of Rashad Khalifa about the last two verses of the chapter of Tawbah. He argues that these were two false verses that were added by two scribes nineteen years after the death of the prophet.
So the difference is between considering something divine but not part of the Qur’an as opposed to considering something to be a fabrication that was added to the Qur’an later.
Thanks for your good questions and hope this helped.
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Related Topics:
- Proof of Sunnah
- Sunnah vs. Hadith
- Sunnah vs. Hadith (Follow Up 1: Imitating the Prophet - pbuh)
- Sunnah vs. Hadith (Follow Up 2: Criteria for Accepting a Hadith)
- Sunnah vs. Hadith (Follow Up 3: Definition of Established Sunnah)
- Sunnah vs. Hadith (Follow Up 4: Beard)
- Sunnah vs. Hadith (follow up 5)
- Sunnah Vs. Hadith Follow Up Discussion
- Differences of views about what is Sunnah
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Farhad Shafti
September 2018