“Common Ground News Service”（www.commongroundnews.org）
‘Hadiths provide guidance too’ by Amin Farzanefar，31 December 2007
（Source: Qantara.de, www.qantara.de）
Translated from German by John Bergeron.
Bonn, Germany - In public discourse in the West, it is assumed that the Qur’an is the sole foundation of the Islamic faith, and other sources, which contribute to the diversity of the faith, are simply ignored. Marco Schöller, a scholar of Islam who has now translated the popular hadith collection of al-Nawawi into German, elaborates on this particular source in the following interview:
Mr. Schöller, what is a hadith?
Marco Schöller: The term refers to a message or information that is conveyed by word of mouth. As a specialist term, it means a story by Muhammad or about him – what he said, did, or how he observed something, etc. These hadiths have been passed down orally and were only recorded in written form at a later date, being transmitted further as books or collections.
How authentic are the hadiths?
Schöller: Here, Islamic scholarship takes a fundamentally different view than that of the Muslim world. There are hundreds of thousands of hadiths in circulation. Muslims regard a few thousand as authentic. Islamic scholarship can neither prove nor refute this, but recognises that, in many cases, these texts are extremely old. A small number of hadiths have attained canonical status, while six collections – and there are a further four or five – are considered to be fundamental to the faith and today are, in principle, no longer criticised.
Over and above these are thousands of collections, offering an enormous amount of material. There is such an abundance here that it makes historical classification very difficult.
Are hadiths still read today? Do people having disputes consult family members well versed in the hadiths? Do they turn to hadith scholars? What role do hadiths play in the faith?
Schöller: Yes, all these cases hold true. The most important thing to keep in mind is that hadiths play a very important role in the lives of the faithful – depending on how pious they are, of course. Information on hadiths is available everywhere. Many books, however, don't present them in the original collected form with their difficult language, but rather as a small selection. Depending on one's degree of literacy, learning by rote is also still practiced in the Arab world.
People rely on scholars, private teachers, or state run schools. The state employs scholars, muftis for instance, to provide guidance on certain issues. It would be difficult to find a Muslim that wasn't familiar with even just a few hadiths of the Prophet.
Is this also the case for the younger generation?
Schöller: No longer here in Europe, of course, but this can be assumed to still apply in the Muslim world, where the environment, schools and family connections help to maintain the practice. I believe that it just isn't possible to live in a Muslim country with the kinds of social and religious demarcations found in the West.
How well can these ancient hadiths be applied to modern-day situations, to issues totally unknown when they were recorded? How is this done?
Schöller: The hadiths are intended to help Muslims live their daily lives according to specific models and examples. Society continuously poses new questions – these can range from creating or eating genetically manipulated food to abortion. Here is one example of how an over 1000-year-old hadith can be applied today: the embryo in the womb only receives a soul after 40 days. Many Muslims interpret this as meaning the embryo is not yet human and can therefore be aborted within the first 40 days.
The West is currently very much occupied with the question of the essence of Islam. Can you infer from the hadiths a particular spirit or essence of Islam?
Schöller: Western readers will find passages that are, if not irreconcilable, then extremely contrasting. In just about any collection you will find very general hadiths, which don't seem in any way specific to Islam and that are permeated with an all-around humanistic spirit. On the other hand, there are hadiths that provide extremely strict and detailed regulations that apply both to individuals and society at large. These seem very difficult to reconcile with each other.
Quite simply put, our Judeo-Christian background offers a dualism – Christianity as the ethical religion that has transcended the law, and Judaism as the religion of the law. In Islam, we have these two facets operating side-by-side. It would prove fatal to try to play them off against each other; doing so would go against the spirit of Islam.
Amin Farzanefar is a correspondent for Qantara.de. Marco Schöller lectures at the Oriental Seminar of the University of Cologne in Germany.
（Copyright permission is granted for publication.）
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