About this course
Follow the development of hadith from transmission and writing to collection and criticism. The course begins with terminology, isnad and hadith qudsi, then examines debates over recording hadith and the emergence of major Sunni and Shia collections.
The later sections address forgery, authentication and classifications of reports. They also consider why narrations differ, examining audience, context, conditions, changing terminology and dialect. This progression places the language of hadith study alongside the historical and interpretive questions that accompany it.
What you’ll explore
- Hadith terminology, isnad and hadith qudsi
- The history of writing, prohibiting and collecting hadith
- Major Sunni and Shia hadith collections
- Forgery, criticism and classifications of reports
- Contradictions, contextual clues and differences between narrations
- Audience, time, conditions, terminology and dialect
Curriculum
- 01The Definition and Significance of Hadith
- 02The Role of Isnaad in Hadith Authentication
- 03What Defines Hadith Literature?
- 04Defining Hadith Qudsi
- 05The Merits of Narrating Hadith
- 06The Merits of Writing and Memorizing Hadith
- 07The Quran and the Practice of Writing
- 08Conflicting Reports on Writing Hadith of the Prophet
Show the full curriculum (44)
- 09Hadith Prohibition During the Life of the Prophet
- 10Hadith Prohibition on the Prophet's Deathbed
- 11Hadith Prohibition During Abu Bakr's Caliphate
- 12Hadith Prohibition During Umar's Caliphate
- 13Hadith Prohibition During the Umayyad Caliphate
- 14Motivations Behind Hadith Prohibition
- 15Early Hadith Collection
- 16The Emergence of Musannaf Collections
- 17The Musnad Era
- 18The Sahih and Sunan Movement
- 19The Six Authentic Hadith Books in Sunni Islam
- 20Other Sunni Books of Hadith
- 21The Most Comprehensive Sunni Hadith Book
- 22Hadith of the Ahlul Bayt
- 23Hadith Collections of Ahlul Bayt
- 24Shia Resistance Against Hadith Ban
- 25Ancient Books of Hadith
- 26The Four Hundred Usul
- 27The Four Most Reliable Shia Hadith Collections
- 28Other Shia Hadith Collections
- 29The Journalist Analogy
- 30The Problem of Hadith Forgery
- 31The Development of Early Sunni Hadith Criticism
- 32Levels of Hadith in Sunni Islam
- 33Shia Hadith Criticism
- 34Levels of Hadith in Shia Islam
- 35Variances in Hadith
- 36Audiences of Prophetic Hadith
- 37Imam Ali Explains Why Hadiths Differ
- 38Contradictions in Shia Hadith
- 39Personal vs Universal
- 40Time-Bound vs Timeless
- 41Conditional vs Absolute
- 42The Loss of Contextual Clues
- 43Changing Terminology
- 44The Influence of Dialect
Before you begin
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