From Nida’ul Magazine
” ‘An Abi Huraira radiyallahu anhu qal, qala Rasul Allahi, sallallahu alayhi wa sallam….”
(On the authority of Abu Huraira, may Allah be pleased with him, he said: Allah’s Messenger (s.a.w) said…)
Through this phrase millions of Muslims from early history of Islam to the present have come to be familiar with the name Abu Huraira, who you expect to find his name in most Hadith, Sirah or Fiqh books.
Abu Huraira (r.a.a) enjoyed a great talent, he was gifted with an extraordinary long term memory to the extent that he would hear a discussion or a speech and be able to reproduce the identical discussion or speech years later without changing or deleting one single word from it.
This great gift that Abu-Huraira enjoyed could have been the worst thing that could have happened to him as some people used his well known and authentic name to make up false Ahadith about our beloved Prophet, and link these false Ahadith to Abu Huraira (r.a.a). However, through hard and sincere efforts put in by some of the pious scholars who sacrificed their lives to preserve and save our beloved Prophet’s Ahadith (sayings) and save them from any harm by the enemies of Islam who tried to mislead Muslims by adding to them thing that were never said by the Prophet of Allah (s.w.t), Abu Huraira’s reputation was saved from their wrong doing until our present day.
Abu Huraira became a Muslim at the hands of At-Tufayl Ibn Amr who was the chief of the tribe to which he belonged. When he submitted to the truthfulness of this religion, he accompanied At-Tufayl to Makkah and had the privilege of meeting the noble Prophet (s.a.w.). The Prophet (s.a.w) asked Abu Huraira what his name was, “Abdu-Shams” (the servant of the sun), Abu Huraira replied. So he was introduced by the holy Prophet (s.a.w) to change his name to “Abdur-Rahman” (the servant of the Beneficent). However, he continued to be known among people as “Abu Hurrah” (the kitten’s father) because of his love for a cat he looked after and fed, and which used to stick to him wherever he went.
Abu Huraira lived with his mother who was still a Mushrik. He prayed for her and tried hard to convince her to join Islam, but she adamantly refused. One day when he was telling her about Islam she uttered some words about the Prophet which saddened Abu Huraira greatly. He went to the Prophet (s.a.w), his eyes full of tears and told him about what had happened between him and his mother. He also asked the Prophet to make supplication to Allah (s.w.t) for her to make her heart respond to Islam. The Prophet responded to Abu Huraira’s request and prayed for his mother. When Abu Huraira returned home he was delighted to hear his mother, who had just taken a shower, testifying that there is no god but Allah and that Muhammad is His Servant and His Messenger. So he rushed back to the Prophet with his eyes glowing with joy, and informed him that Allah had answered his prayers, and guided his mother to Islam. He then said: “O Allah’s Messenger, Ask Allah to make me and my mother lovable to the believing men and juices” . So he (s.a.w.) said: “O Allah, make this servant of yours and his mother lovable to every believing man and woman” .
With his great gift and talent, Abu Huraira realised that he was able to serve this religion a great deal. He realised that, because many of the early companions who had the most knowledge died in the battles in Allah’s cause, this religion needed people to preserve it, as in these days the companions used to write only the Qur’an fearing it might get mixed with the Hadith of the Messenger, if the latter was to be documented too. Even among those who had a great deal of knowledge, many of them were occupied by their trades and didn’t have as much delicious time as Abu Huraira to spend with the Prophet (s.a.w). Also the fact that he had an extraordinary long term memory meant that he could hear the Prophet’s teachings and be able to ask a writer to write them later knowing that he will not forget any of them. Therefore, during the four years Abu Huraira stayed with the Prophet (s.a.w) in Madinah, he set himself to accompany the holy Prophet to gain knowledge and memorise his sayings and teachings in order to preserve the word of Allah (s.w.t) and the teachings of his beloved Prophet (s.a.w). The Prophet (s.a.w.) himself directed Abu Huraira to an effective way to memorise his Hadiths, Abu Hurrah said: Allah’s Prophet one day said to us: “whoever spreads his dress until I finish my talk, and then takes hold of it, will not forget anything from what he heard from me” .
The fact that Abu Huraira set himself to preserve the teachings of the noble Prophet, meant that he was always close to the Prophet (s.a.w) in his stay in Madinah, as he had delicious time at his disposal, unlike the Muhajirin he did not work in trade and unlike the Ansar he did not have a land to look after. This enabled Abu Huraira to stay with the noble Prophet at Madinah and to go with him on journeys and expeditions.
He loved the Prophet a great deal, he was never tired of looking at the Prophet nor was he tired of listening to him. Often he would praise Allah for his good fortune and say “Praise be to Allah who has guided Abu Huraira to Islam, Praise be to Allah who taught Abu Huraira the Qur’an, Praise be to Allah who has bestowed on Abu Huraira the companionship of Muhammad (s.a.w)” .
Abu Huraira underwent much hardship and difficulties as a result of devoting his life to knowledge and companionship of the holy Prophet (s.a.w): “One day, my hunger became so severe that I placed a stone on my stomach. I then sat down in the path of the companions. Abu Bakr passed by and I asked him about an Ayah of the book of God. I only asked him so that he would invite me but he didn’t”.
Despite the fact that Abu Huraira set himself to preserving the word of Allah and the teachings of his Prophet, he by no means neglected his other duties as much of his time was spend in prayers and devotion to God. He often rotated staying up at night with his wife and his daughter, as he would stay up for a third of the night, his wife for another third and his daughter for a third, this way in the house of Abu Huraira no hour of the night would pass without Ibadah and Salat. Abu Huraira’s presence was also felt in the battlefield when needed to protect and establish the religion of Islam by the sword, as he lived all his life, since becoming a Muslim, as a soldier of Islam not missing a single battle with the holy Prophet (s.a.w).
After the death of the holy Prophet (s.a.w), Abu Huraira continued his duties in conveying the teachings of the Prophet (s.a.w). He went on preaching a great number of Ahadith, which made some of his friends curious of the large amount of Ahadith that he memorised in such a short time. Although the fact that he was able to memorise so many Ahadith was justified by the fact that he was dedicated to staying with the Prophet and due to the extraordinary ability to memorise speeches from the first time.
During the caliphate of Umar (r.a.a), Umar appointed him as a governor of Bahrain where he became quiet rich. Umar, being very scrupulous about the type of persons he appointed as governors, he was concerned that his governors should live simply and frugally and not acquire much wealth even through lawful means. When Umar (r.a.a) heard about Abu Huraira’s wealth he recalled him to Madinah, thinking that Abu Huraira had acquired his wealth through unlawful means.
When Abu Huraira arrived in Madinah, Umar questioned him about the way he acquired such a fortune. Abu Huraira replied “from breeding horses and gifts that I received” . Umar then ordered him to hand his fortune over to the treasury of the Muslims. Abu Huraira did as he was ordered and raised his hands to the heavens and prayed “O Lord, forgive Amir ul-Muminin” . After a while Umar called upon Abu Huraira and offered him to regain his position as the governor of Bahrain but Abu Huraira refused the offer. When he was asked by Umar why he refused his offer he replied “So that my honor would not be besmirched, and my wealth would not be taken and my back would not be beaten” . He then added “I also fear to judge without knowledge and speak without wisdom”.
Abu Huraira continued to live a righteous life, devoting himself to serve the religion of Islam and being kind to his mother as well as encouraging others to be kind to their parents. One day when Abu Huraira’s health was deteriorating quickly and his friends were praying for him to recover, he looked to the heavens and said “O Allah I love meeting you and ask you to love meeting me” . He then died in the year 59 after Hijra when he was seventy eight years old.
He died after having accomplished his duty and his desire to preserve and transmit the teachings of the Holy Prophet (s.a.w), leaving Muslims a great debt of gratitude for helping to preserve the teachings of the noble Prophet (s.a.w) and setting them a perfect example and platform to follow in preaching and conveying to the humanity what he and others had worked relentlessly, facing all sorts of hardships, in order to preserve. We ask Allah (s.w.t) to reward Abu Huraira and grant him the companionship of the holy Prophet in the hereafter just as he was granted his companionship in this world.
Â
Shi’a and the narration of Hadith by Hadrat Abu Huraira [RA]
Shi’a and the narration of Hadith by Hadrat Abu Huraira [RA]
Question:
****es claim that it is impossible for one man, Abu Huriara, to hear so many hadith, from our prophet (saws), hence a large number of them are fabricated.
So my question is, can you please explain to me how one man, Abu Huriara, can narrate so many hadith from our beloved prophet (saws), when he (Abu Huriara) only lived along side the prophet (saws) for a small number of years.
Also is there any man or men from the shia side who have a large number of hadith, attributed to their name.
May Allah Bless Your Efforts.
Bilal
Canada
Answer:
Dear brother, I am not aware of any rules in the science of Rejal (knowledge of narrators of ahadith) suggesting that a narrator can be rejected merely based on the number of ahadith that are narrated from him/her. If this is the only reason that a Shia brother is rejecting Abu Hurairah than I am interested to see a reference to this ruling from a Shia or a mainstream book of Rejal and that how exactly it can be applied in this case.
Having said that, I do agree that the notion of “Abu Hurairah narrating a huge number of ahadith while being with the Prophet for only few years” can raise some questions for a rational mind.
I try to clarify this by the following facts:
1.
If one counts the number of ahadith narrated in Bukhari from Abu Hurairah, one will come up with a figure more than 1000. This however does not mean that Bukhari has narrated 1000 different ahadith from Abu Hurairah. Many of the ahadith in hadith books are repeated often with minor differences in the context. According to Ibn Hajar, in Fat’h Al-Bari, there are no more than 446 ahadith from Abu Hurairah in Bukhari and the rest are just repetitions. This is equally the same for the other books of hadith. Also we cannot simply add up the number of ahadith of Abu Hurairah in different books of hadith to get the total figure. Again many of these ahadith are repeated across books of hadith. For instance according to a count by Al-Dhahabi, in Syar Alam Annobala, if we count the ahadith from Abu Hurairah in the book of Muslim (ignoring the repeated ones), we will find that only 98 of them are different from those narrated in Bukhari. It is therefore possible to conclude that the total number of narrations from Abu Hurairah in Sahihayn (ignoring the repeated ones) is no more than about 544 hadith (446 + 98). I however do appreciate that comparing to the other companions’ ahadith narrated by Abu Hurairah are significantly more.
2.
Abu Hurairah was keeping the company of the prophet from three (as narrated in Bukhari) to more than four (as stated in Fat’h Albari) years. The prophet was not a silent man, he used to advise and preach for people as much as possible. Also not all the ahadith are about narrations form the prophet, many of them are about his practices and daily life.
3.
The reports and the ahadith suggest that the life style of Abu Hurairah was different from that of most of the companions. While others were engaged with their family affairs and job, Abu Hurairah (with no wife or job) used to spend most of his time accompanying the Prophet wherever he would go and also asking him questions. Abu Hurairah also lived much longer than many of the other companions.
4.
In the mainstream school of thought Abu Hurairah is a famous narrator of hadith. We cannot rule out the possibility that there could be fabricated ahadith in some books of hadith that are falsely attributed to Abu Hurairah simply for the sake of the credit.
Based on the above, I don’t think it is hard to believe that Abu Hurairah has heard and seen a lot from the Prophet after accepting Islam.
Let me now come to the point of view of the Shia school of thought:
In the book Al-Rijal by Ibn-Dawood Helli that is one of the popular Shia books of Rijal, the name of Abu Hurairah has come as the 821st entry under the title: “The list of people who are praised and have not been considered as weak by (Shia Scholar) colleagues to my knowledge”:
I am aware of only one hadith in the main Shia books in which Abu Hurairah is categorically called a liar (that is in the book Al-Khisal by Al-Sadooq). On the other hand you will find a good number of ahadith narrated from Abu Hurairah in some of the Shia books that are considered extremely reliable by Shia scholars. Among them is Amali by Al-Toosi that (according to many Shia scholars) is even more reliable than the main four collection of Shia ahadith. According to my count, there are 34 ahadith narrated from Abu Hurairah on a variety of subjects in this book. The number is not small if you consider that usually Shia ahadith are originated from their Imams rather than a companion. In no place in these books (as far as I see) there are any comments from the author expressing any concerns about the reliability of these ahadith because of Abu Hurairah.
Many of the ahadith in praise of Ahl Al-Bayt are in fact narrated by Abu Hurairah. On the other hand many of the ahadith that Shia criticise Abu Hurairah about their content are also narrated in Shia books.
It is also interesting that there are ahadith from Ali Ibn Al-Husayn (RA), Muhammad Al-Baqir (RA), and Jafar Al-Sadiq (RA) – the 4th, 5th and 6th Imams of Shia – narrated from Abu Hurairah in the most reliable mainstream books of Hadith.
It seems like the classic Shia scholars had less problem with accepting ahadith of Abu Hurairah. It seems like the more recent Shia scholars are showing more opposition towards the ahadith of Abu Hurairah.
In my opinion there is a certain reason behind this:
There is not even a single hadith (to my knowledge) from the Prophet against Abu Hurairah. Yet, Imami Shia scholars reject Abu Hurairah based on his number of ahadith or a single hadith from Shia Imams. In comparison you will find that there are many Shia narrators who have been called liars by Shia Imams or were famous for being drunk or having false beliefs or have been even cursed by Shia Imams in some occasions. Yet (after some justification arguments that are beyond the scope of this post) their ahadith are accepted by Shia.
The book Al-Kafi, for instance, is considered as one of the main sources of Shia ahadith and was considered as an all reliable book by many classic Shia scholars (to the degree that some Shia scholars even claimed that the book had been endorsed by Imam Mahdi of Shia). Today however most of the Shia scholars do agree that the majority of the ahadith of Al-Kafi are weak. According to a very famous Shia scholar, known as Shahid Al-Thani, out of 16,121 ahadith of Al-Kafi, 9,485 are weak (i.e. 59%) and only 5072 (i.e. 31%) can be considered as authentic (Sahih) while the rest fall in between. Most of the other Shia books of hadith have a similar (if not worse) condition. Despite this, many factors (that are not directly relevant to the subject of this post) have prevented Shia scholars to openly and seriously reject this number of hadith with a clear conscious.
Overall, in my opinion, the late establishment and difficult condition of the science of Rejal in Shia and consequently the not very promising condition of the Shia ahadith (in terms of reliability) has resulted the latter time Shia scholars to criticize Abu Hurairah (knowing that rejecting him means rejecting many of the main stream Ahadith). This (in my opinion) was an attempt to equalize the conditions of the two schools of thought in terms of Hadith.
You asked: “Also is there any man or men from the shia side who have a large number of hadith, attributed to their name.”
In deed there are and I leave you with some examples with no further comments about them:
*
The Shia scholars Al-Najjashi and Ibne Dawood in their famous books of Al-Rijal and Abdul Hussain Sharafeddin in his book Al-Muraje’at state that the very reliable narrator of Shia ahadith, Aban Ibn Taqlab, has narrated 30,000 ahadith from Imam Sadiq (RA)
*
Again in Al-Rijal of Al-Kashi we read that another very reliable Shia narrator Muhammad Ibn Muslim has acquired 30,000 ahadith from Imam Baqir (RA) and 16,000 from Imam Sadiq (RA).
*
In the same book it is mentioned that another Shia narrator, Jabir Ibn Yazid Al-Ju’fi, has learned 70,000 ahadith from Imam Baqir (RA).
Dear brother, please note that in this post I only present you with a number of facts and some concluding remarks based on them. There is no question that every hadith has to be tested from both points of view of narrators (Riwayah) and content (Diraya). (Irrespective of who is the narrator or what book has recorded the hadith) any hadith that is not inline with the Qur’an, the Sunnah and, if relevant, the established facts of history and science cannot be considered as a reliable one or should be understood and interpreted in the light of the above mentioned bases.
Hope this helps.
In need of your prayers.
Abdullah Rahim
November 3, 2003
===========
SOME MORE POINTS
Of the 5000+ hadith that Abu Hurairah narrated, less than ten were narrated by him alone (all the remaining were narrated by other companions as well.)
It is logically impossible that he made up 5000 hadith and somehow other companions also made up the exact same 5000.
Now about Abu Huraira, may Allah be pleased with him :
Abu Hurayrah loved the Prophet a great deal and found favor with him. He was never tired of looking at the Prophet whose face appeared to him as having all the radiance of the sun and he was never tired of listening to him. Often he would praise God for his good fortune and say: “Praise be to God Who has guided Abu Hurayrah to Islam.” Praise be to God Who has taught Abu Hurayrah the Quran.”
“Praise be to God who has bestowed on Abu Hurayrah the companionship of Muhammad, may God bless him and grant him peace.” On reaching Madinah, Abu Hurayrah set his heart on attaining knowledge. Zayd ibn Thabit the notable companion of the Prophet reported: “While Abu Hurayrah and I and another friend of mine were in the Masjid praying to God Almighty and performing dhikr to Him, the Messenger of God appeared. He came towards us and sat among us. We became silent and he said: “Carry on with what you were doing.”
“So my friend and I made a supplication to God before Abu Hurayrah did and the Prophet began to say Ameen to our dua.
“Then Abu Hurayrah made a supplication saying: “O Lord, I ask You for what my two companions have asked and I ask You for knowledge which will not be forgotten.”
“The Prophet, peace be on him, said: ‘Ameen.’ “We then said: ‘And we ask Allah for knowledge which will not be forgotten, and the Prophet replied: ‘The Dawsi youth has asked for this before you.” “With his formidable memory, Abu Hurayrah set out to memorize in the four years that he spent with the Prophet, the gems of wisdom that emanated from his lips. He realized that he had a great gift and he set about to use it to the full in the service of Islam.
He had free time at his disposal. Unlike many of the Muhajirin he did not busy himself’ in the market-places, with buying and selling. Unlike many of the Ansar, he had no land to cultivate nor crops to tend. He stayed with the Prophet in Madinah and went with him on journeys and expeditions.
Many companions were amazed at the number of hadith he had memorized and often questioned him on when he had heard a certain hadith and under what circumstances.
Once Marwan ibn al-Hakam wanted to test Abu Hurayrah’s power of memory. He sat with him in one room and behind a curtain he placed a scribe, unknown to Abu Hurayrah, and ordered him to write down whatever Abu Hurayrah said. A year later, Marwan called Abu Hurayrah again and asked him to recall the same ahadith which the scribe had recorded. It was found that he had forgotten not a single word.
Abu Hurayrah was concerned to teach and transmit the ahadith he had memorized and knowledge of Islam in general. It is reported that one day he passed through the suq of Madinah and naturally saw people engrossed in the business of buying and selling.
“How feeble are you, O people of Madinah!” he said. “What do you see that is feeble in us, Abu Hurayrah?” they asked. “The inheritance of the Messenger of God, peace be on him, is being distributed and you remain here! Won’t you go and take your portion?” “Where is this, O Abu Hurayrah?” they asked. “In the Masjid,” he replied.
Quickly they left. Abu Hurayrah waited until they returned. When they saw him, they said: “O Abu Hurayrah, we went to the Masjid and entered and we did not see anything being distributed.” “Didn’t you see anyone in the Masjid?” he asked. “O yes, we saw some people performing Salat, some people reading the Quran and some people discussing about what is halal and what is haram.” “Woe unto you,” replied Abu Hurayrah,” that is the inheritance of Muhammad, may God bless him and grant him peace.”
=====
Yes, he himself answered this question when he was asked, he said that he was one of “ahl elsofaa” these people used to live in the mosque, so he was almost with the prophet every day, 5374 hadith means an average of 5 per day which is not too much for the prophet spending most of his time in mosque teaching people,
the quran was not revealed every day , 6236 verse of quran means that an average of 20 verse per month.
edit:
btw, how do you that Abu Huraira accompanied the prophet only for 3 years? you don’t trust the hadith, why do you trust the one it say that?
edit:
yes, it is known , and accepted even by non-Muslim that 1400 years ago people used to depends on their memory other than writings.
one of the conditions for a person who tell the hadith is that he has such strong memory.
it is strange that a Muslim deny what the non-Muslims are not able to deny.
@FTL
Nahju’l-Balagha is not an authentic book, and not reliable source, all your claims are false
============
Narrated Abu Huraira:
I said to Allah’s Apostle “I hear many narrations (Hadiths) from you but I forget them.” Allah’s Apostle said, “Spread your Rida’ (garment).” I did accordingly and then he moved his hands as if filling them with something (and emptied them in my Rida’) and then said, “Take and wrap this sheet over your body.” I did it and after that I never forgot any thing.
I understand the idea behind questioning the authenticity of hadiths. I feel there is alot of wisdom of many of the hadiths, however if you find something that goes against the Quran or your own rationale then don’t accept it. This why were given a brain, to help us separate wrong from right
Question:
****es claim that it is impossible for one man, Abu Huriara, to hear so many hadith, from our prophet (saws), hence a large number of them are fabricated.
So my question is, can you please explain to me how one man, Abu Huriara, can narrate so many hadith from our beloved prophet (saws), when he (Abu Huriara) only lived along side the prophet (saws) for a small number of years.
Also is there any man or men from the shia side who have a large number of hadith, attributed to their name.
May Allah Bless Your Efforts.
Bilal
Canada
Answer:
Dear brother, I am not aware of any rules in the science of Rejal (knowledge of narrators of ahadith) suggesting that a narrator can be rejected merely based on the number of ahadith that are narrated from him/her. If this is the only reason that a Shia brother is rejecting Abu Hurairah than I am interested to see a reference to this ruling from a Shia or a mainstream book of Rejal and that how exactly it can be applied in this case.
Having said that, I do agree that the notion of “Abu Hurairah narrating a huge number of ahadith while being with the Prophet for only few years” can raise some questions for a rational mind.
I try to clarify this by the following facts:
1.
If one counts the number of ahadith narrated in Bukhari from Abu Hurairah, one will come up with a figure more than 1000. This however does not mean that Bukhari has narrated 1000 different ahadith from Abu Hurairah. Many of the ahadith in hadith books are repeated often with minor differences in the context. According to Ibn Hajar, in Fat’h Al-Bari, there are no more than 446 ahadith from Abu Hurairah in Bukhari and the rest are just repetitions. This is equally the same for the other books of hadith. Also we cannot simply add up the number of ahadith of Abu Hurairah in different books of hadith to get the total figure. Again many of these ahadith are repeated across books of hadith. For instance according to a count by Al-Dhahabi, in Syar Alam Annobala, if we count the ahadith from Abu Hurairah in the book of Muslim (ignoring the repeated ones), we will find that only 98 of them are different from those narrated in Bukhari. It is therefore possible to conclude that the total number of narrations from Abu Hurairah in Sahihayn (ignoring the repeated ones) is no more than about 544 hadith (446 + 98). I however do appreciate that comparing to the other companions’ ahadith narrated by Abu Hurairah are significantly more.
2.
Abu Hurairah was keeping the company of the prophet from three (as narrated in Bukhari) to more than four (as stated in Fat’h Albari) years. The prophet was not a silent man, he used to advise and preach for people as much as possible. Also not all the ahadith are about narrations form the prophet, many of them are about his practices and daily life.
3.
The reports and the ahadith suggest that the life style of Abu Hurairah was different from that of most of the companions. While others were engaged with their family affairs and job, Abu Hurairah (with no wife or job) used to spend most of his time accompanying the Prophet wherever he would go and also asking him questions. Abu Hurairah also lived much longer than many of the other companions.
4.
In the mainstream school of thought Abu Hurairah is a famous narrator of hadith. We cannot rule out the possibility that there could be fabricated ahadith in some books of hadith that are falsely attributed to Abu Hurairah simply for the sake of the credit.
Based on the above, I don’t think it is hard to believe that Abu Hurairah has heard and seen a lot from the Prophet after accepting Islam.
Let me now come to the point of view of the Shia school of thought:
In the book Al-Rijal by Ibn-Dawood Helli that is one of the popular Shia books of Rijal, the name of Abu Hurairah has come as the 821st entry under the title: “The list of people who are praised and have not been considered as weak by (Shia Scholar) colleagues to my knowledge”:
I am aware of only one hadith in the main Shia books in which Abu Hurairah is categorically called a liar (that is in the book Al-Khisal by Al-Sadooq). On the other hand you will find a good number of ahadith narrated from Abu Hurairah in some of the Shia books that are considered extremely reliable by Shia scholars. Among them is Amali by Al-Toosi that (according to many Shia scholars) is even more reliable than the main four collection of Shia ahadith. According to my count, there are 34 ahadith narrated from Abu Hurairah on a variety of subjects in this book. The number is not small if you consider that usually Shia ahadith are originated from their Imams rather than a companion. In no place in these books (as far as I see) there are any comments from the author expressing any concerns about the reliability of these ahadith because of Abu Hurairah.
Many of the ahadith in praise of Ahl Al-Bayt are in fact narrated by Abu Hurairah. On the other hand many of the ahadith that Shia criticise Abu Hurairah about their content are also narrated in Shia books.
It is also interesting that there are ahadith from Ali Ibn Al-Husayn (RA), Muhammad Al-Baqir (RA), and Jafar Al-Sadiq (RA) – the 4th, 5th and 6th Imams of Shia – narrated from Abu Hurairah in the most reliable mainstream books of Hadith.
It seems like the classic Shia scholars had less problem with accepting ahadith of Abu Hurairah. It seems like the more recent Shia scholars are showing more opposition towards the ahadith of Abu Hurairah.
In my opinion there is a certain reason behind this:
There is not even a single hadith (to my knowledge) from the Prophet against Abu Hurairah. Yet, Imami Shia scholars reject Abu Hurairah based on his number of ahadith or a single hadith from Shia Imams. In comparison you will find that there are many Shia narrators who have been called liars by Shia Imams or were famous for being drunk or having false beliefs or have been even cursed by Shia Imams in some occasions. Yet (after some justification arguments that are beyond the scope of this post) their ahadith are accepted by Shia.
The book Al-Kafi, for instance, is considered as one of the main sources of Shia ahadith and was considered as an all reliable book by many classic Shia scholars (to the degree that some Shia scholars even claimed that the book had been endorsed by Imam Mahdi of Shia). Today however most of the Shia scholars do agree that the majority of the ahadith of Al-Kafi are weak. According to a very famous Shia scholar, known as Shahid Al-Thani, out of 16,121 ahadith of Al-Kafi, 9,485 are weak (i.e. 59%) and only 5072 (i.e. 31%) can be considered as authentic (Sahih) while the rest fall in between. Most of the other Shia books of hadith have a similar (if not worse) condition. Despite this, many factors (that are not directly relevant to the subject of this post) have prevented Shia scholars to openly and seriously reject this number of hadith with a clear conscious.
Overall, in my opinion, the late establishment and difficult condition of the science of Rejal in Shia and consequently the not very promising condition of the Shia ahadith (in terms of reliability) has resulted the latter time Shia scholars to criticize Abu Hurairah (knowing that rejecting him means rejecting many of the main stream Ahadith). This (in my opinion) was an attempt to equalize the conditions of the two schools of thought in terms of Hadith.
You asked: “Also is there any man or men from the shia side who have a large number of hadith, attributed to their name.”
In deed there are and I leave you with some examples with no further comments about them:
*
The Shia scholars Al-Najjashi and Ibne Dawood in their famous books of Al-Rijal and Abdul Hussain Sharafeddin in his book Al-Muraje’at state that the very reliable narrator of Shia ahadith, Aban Ibn Taqlab, has narrated 30,000 ahadith from Imam Sadiq (RA)
*
Again in Al-Rijal of Al-Kashi we read that another very reliable Shia narrator Muhammad Ibn Muslim has acquired 30,000 ahadith from Imam Baqir (RA) and 16,000 from Imam Sadiq (RA).
*
In the same book it is mentioned that another Shia narrator, Jabir Ibn Yazid Al-Ju’fi, has learned 70,000 ahadith from Imam Baqir (RA).
Dear brother, please note that in this post I only present you with a number of facts and some concluding remarks based on them. There is no question that every hadith has to be tested from both points of view of narrators (Riwayah) and content (Diraya). (Irrespective of who is the narrator or what book has recorded the hadith) any hadith that is not inline with the Qur’an, the Sunnah and, if relevant, the established facts of history and science cannot be considered as a reliable one or should be understood and interpreted in the light of the above mentioned bases.
Hope this helps.
In need of your prayers.
Abdullah Rahim
November 3, 2003
===========
SOME MORE POINTS
Of the 5000+ hadith that Abu Hurairah narrated, less than ten were narrated by him alone (all the remaining were narrated by other companions as well.)
It is logically impossible that he made up 5000 hadith and somehow other companions also made up the exact same 5000.
Now about Abu Huraira, may Allah be pleased with him :
Abu Hurayrah loved the Prophet a great deal and found favor with him. He was never tired of looking at the Prophet whose face appeared to him as having all the radiance of the sun and he was never tired of listening to him. Often he would praise God for his good fortune and say: “Praise be to God Who has guided Abu Hurayrah to Islam.” Praise be to God Who has taught Abu Hurayrah the Quran.”
“Praise be to God who has bestowed on Abu Hurayrah the companionship of Muhammad, may God bless him and grant him peace.” On reaching Madinah, Abu Hurayrah set his heart on attaining knowledge. Zayd ibn Thabit the notable companion of the Prophet reported: “While Abu Hurayrah and I and another friend of mine were in the Masjid praying to God Almighty and performing dhikr to Him, the Messenger of God appeared. He came towards us and sat among us. We became silent and he said: “Carry on with what you were doing.”
“So my friend and I made a supplication to God before Abu Hurayrah did and the Prophet began to say Ameen to our dua.
“Then Abu Hurayrah made a supplication saying: “O Lord, I ask You for what my two companions have asked and I ask You for knowledge which will not be forgotten.”
“The Prophet, peace be on him, said: ‘Ameen.’ “We then said: ‘And we ask Allah for knowledge which will not be forgotten, and the Prophet replied: ‘The Dawsi youth has asked for this before you.” “With his formidable memory, Abu Hurayrah set out to memorize in the four years that he spent with the Prophet, the gems of wisdom that emanated from his lips. He realized that he had a great gift and he set about to use it to the full in the service of Islam.
He had free time at his disposal. Unlike many of the Muhajirin he did not busy himself’ in the market-places, with buying and selling. Unlike many of the Ansar, he had no land to cultivate nor crops to tend. He stayed with the Prophet in Madinah and went with him on journeys and expeditions.
Many companions were amazed at the number of hadith he had memorized and often questioned him on when he had heard a certain hadith and under what circumstances.
Once Marwan ibn al-Hakam wanted to test Abu Hurayrah’s power of memory. He sat with him in one room and behind a curtain he placed a scribe, unknown to Abu Hurayrah, and ordered him to write down whatever Abu Hurayrah said. A year later, Marwan called Abu Hurayrah again and asked him to recall the same ahadith which the scribe had recorded. It was found that he had forgotten not a single word.
Abu Hurayrah was concerned to teach and transmit the ahadith he had memorized and knowledge of Islam in general. It is reported that one day he passed through the suq of Madinah and naturally saw people engrossed in the business of buying and selling.
“How feeble are you, O people of Madinah!” he said. “What do you see that is feeble in us, Abu Hurayrah?” they asked. “The inheritance of the Messenger of God, peace be on him, is being distributed and you remain here! Won’t you go and take your portion?” “Where is this, O Abu Hurayrah?” they asked. “In the Masjid,” he replied.
Quickly they left. Abu Hurayrah waited until they returned. When they saw him, they said: “O Abu Hurayrah, we went to the Masjid and entered and we did not see anything being distributed.” “Didn’t you see anyone in the Masjid?” he asked. “O yes, we saw some people performing Salat, some people reading the Quran and some people discussing about what is halal and what is haram.” “Woe unto you,” replied Abu Hurayrah,” that is the inheritance of Muhammad, may God bless him and grant him peace.”
=====
Yes, he himself answered this question when he was asked, he said that he was one of “ahl elsofaa” these people used to live in the mosque, so he was almost with the prophet every day, 5374 hadith means an average of 5 per day which is not too much for the prophet spending most of his time in mosque teaching people,
the quran was not revealed every day , 6236 verse of quran means that an average of 20 verse per month.
edit:
btw, how do you that Abu Huraira accompanied the prophet only for 3 years? you don’t trust the hadith, why do you trust the one it say that?
edit:
yes, it is known , and accepted even by non-Muslim that 1400 years ago people used to depends on their memory other than writings.
one of the conditions for a person who tell the hadith is that he has such strong memory.
it is strange that a Muslim deny what the non-Muslims are not able to deny.
@FTL
Nahju’l-Balagha is not an authentic book, and not reliable source, all your claims are false
============
Narrated Abu Huraira:
I said to Allah’s Apostle “I hear many narrations (Hadiths) from you but I forget them.” Allah’s Apostle said, “Spread your Rida’ (garment).” I did accordingly and then he moved his hands as if filling them with something (and emptied them in my Rida’) and then said, “Take and wrap this sheet over your body.” I did it and after that I never forgot any thing.
I understand the idea behind questioning the authenticity of hadiths. I feel there is alot of wisdom of many of the hadiths, however if you find something that goes against the Quran or your own rationale then don’t accept it. This why were given a brain, to help us separate wrong from right
