Get HADITH A RE-EVALUATION - Barry Baker - Home Page

Among the leading companions who narrated the most ahadith are Abu Hurayrah, Abdullah Ibn Abbas, Abdullah Ibn Amr Ibn Al-Aas, Abu Bakr, Ibn Umar, etc. [1]. After Islam spread into North Africa, India, and Europe, the preservation of ahadith become instrumental in spreading the true message of Islam.

The first people to hear hadith were the companions who preserved it and then conveyed it to those after them. Then the generation following them received it, thus conveying it to those after them and so on. So a companion would say, "I heard the Prophet say such and such."

Abu Hurairah is credited with narrating at least 5,374 hadith.

Muhammad's first revelation was an event described in Islamic tradition as taking place in AD 610, during which the Islamic prophet Muhammad was visited by the angel Gabriel, who revealed to him the beginnings of what would later become the Qur'an.

He (the narrator, Umar ibn al-Khattab) said: Then he (the inquirer) went on his way but I stayed with him (the Holy Prophet) for a long while.

Abdullah bin Abbas (R.A.) narrated 1660 hadiths from the Prophet Muhammad (PBUH). Jabir bin Abdullah (R.A.) narrated 1540 hadiths from the Prophet Muhammad (PBUH). Abu Said al Khudri (R.A.) narrated 1170 hadiths from the Prophet Muhammad (PBUH).

There are six canonical hadith collections that are widely accepted by Sunni Muslims; the two most famous are those of Muhammad ibn Isma'il al-Bukhari (810–870) and Muslim ibn al-Hajjaj (817–875), both of which have the same title al-Sahih (The Authentic).

There are three primary ways to determine the authenticity (sihha) of a hadith: by attempting to determine whether there are "other identical reports from other transmitters"; determining the reliability of the transmitters of the report; and "the continuity of the chain of transmission" of the hadith.