This may contain minor errors, Allahu Allam.

Saheeh Sitta

JAMI� AS-SAHIH AL-BUKHARI

Compiler: Muhammad ibn Ismail ibn Ibrahim al-Bukhari (194H � 256H) 

The complete name of his compilation is �Al-Jame-ul-Sahih-aI-Musnad-min-ahaadeethe-Rasulillah Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam-wa-sunanihi-wa-Ayyaamihi, and the most likely date of collection was 217 A.H Early third Century of Hijra

General Information: It is generally accepted to be the most reliable and most prestigious of the collections even though Imam muslims collection has a more strict criteria. It is a Jami collection and a musannaf  containing 7275 ahadith selected from a total of 600,000. Al-Bukhari revised it three times. He sought to list only ahadith which possessed uninterrupted chains of credible authorities. It is divided into more than 100 chapters with 3450 subsections, each with a heading to indicate its contents.

Imam Bukhari and Imam Muslim (R.A) used the following to assess hadeeth: 

- �Ilm al-hadeeth Knowledge/Study of the hadeeth

This means the wording the Prophet (s.a.w.) used, its line of transmission and the original listener and/or recorder.

- �Ilm rijaal al-hadeeth Knowledge/Study of the credibility of transmitter

This means analysing the transmitters in terms of:

a. Faith: must be Muslim

b. Puberty: must have reached the age of maturity

c. Mental State: must be of stable mind

d. Sin: avoids sin; does not stray or deviate

          e. Actions/Manners demonstrates an elevated standard of manners
 

- �Ilm al-jarh wa-ta�deel Knowledge/Study of the background of transmitters

This means discerning the reliable sources from the unreliable using details of their history including family background, strengths and weaknesses, consistency in character and so on.

- �Ilm �ilal al-hadeeth Knowledge/Study of the causes/roots/deviations of hadeeth

         This is the most complicated and detailed category and requires great knowledge of every aspect of the Prophet�s (s.a.w.) life that may cast a doubt on the authenticity of a hadeeth. [Imam Muslim leads this category in skill].
 

SAHIH AL-MUSLIM 

Compiler: Abu al-Hussein Muslim ibn al-Hajjaj al-Muslim al-Naysaburi (206H �261H)

General Information: considered to be the second of the two most reliable collections of hadith. It includes 12000 ahadith (with 4000 repetitions) selected from a total of 300,000. It is not considered a Jami� (like Bukhari�s) since it does not contain a complete chapter on tafsir. Muslim is stricter than al Bukhari in pointing out the differences between narrations and has a neater arrangement of the ahadith. It shares about 2300 ahadith with Bukhari�s sahih. 

Imam Muslim like Imam Bukhari used the above criteria to assess hadeeth.

Imam Muslim travelled widely to collect traditions in Arabia, Egypt, Syria and Iraq, where he attended the lectures of some of the prominent Traditionalists of his time: Ishaq b.Rahwaih, Ahmad b. Hanbal, 'Ubaydullah al-Qawariri, Qutaiba b. Sa�id, 'Abdullah b. Maslama, Harmalah b. Yahya, and others.

Having finished his studies, be settled down at Nishapur. There he came into contact with Imam Bukhari, and was so much impressed by his vast knowledge of Hadith and his deep insight into it that he kept himself attached to him up to the end of his life.

Imam Muslim strictly observed many principles of the science of Hadith which had been slightly ignored by his great teacher Imam Bukhari (may Allah have mercy on both of them). Imam Muslim considered only such traditions to be genuine and authentic as had been transmitted to him by an unbroken chain of reliable authorities and were in perfect harmony with what had been related by other narrators whose trustworthiness was unanimously accepted and who were free from all defects.

Moreover, Imam Bukhari, while describing the chain of narrators, sometimes mentions their kunya and sometimes gives their names. He took particular care in according the exact words of the narrators and
points out even the minutest difference in the wording of their reports. Imam Muslim has also constantly kept in view the difference between the two well known modes of narration, haddathana (he narrated to us) and akhbarana (he informed us). He is of the opinion that the first mode is used only when the teacher is narrating the hadith and the student is listening to it, while the second mode of expression implies that the student is reading the hadith before the teacher. This reflects his utmost care in the transmission of a hadith.

He recorded only that hadith which, at least, two reliable tabi'in (successors) had heard from two Companions and this principle is observed throughout the subsequent chain of narrators.

Sunan Abu Dawood 

Compiler: Abu Dawud Sulayman ibn al-Ash�ath as-Sijistani (202H � 275H)

General Information: one of the most comprehensible collections containing 4800 ahadith, mostly on legal matters, selected from 500,000. It was the first book of its type in hadith literature and is considered by some to be the best of the sunan. The author often points out the weakness and peculiarities in the ahadith and their isnads or expresses his preference among the variants of ahadith. 

The work is a basic source of knowledge about the legal points of views held by Imam Malik, Sufyan Al-Thawri and Al-Awza'i and thus Abu Dawud would have used Imam Malik�s Muwatta and the works of the likes of Al-Thawri and Al-Awza�i in the compilation of his sunan. It serves as an arbiter for disagreement among jurists.

He was one of the most widely travelled of the scholars of ahadith, going to Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Khurasahn, Egypt, Syria, Nishapur, Marv, and other places for the sole purpose of collecting ahadith.  

Imam Abu Dawud heard hadith from 300 persons who were his teachers. Some were: Imam Ahmad ibn Hanbal, Ishaq ibn Rahawaiy, Abu Thaur, Yahya ibn Ma'in. For one to grasp his elevated status, he narrated hadith to the teachers of Imam Ahmad. Imam Ahmad ibn Hanbal also narrated one hadith from him. Among the students of Imam Abu Dawud are great personalities like: Ibn Arabi, Abu`Isa al-Tirmidhi and Abu `Abdur-Rahman An Nasa'i. They were transmitters of his famous work Sunan Abu Dawud. Imam Muslim was also one of his pupils.

He completed The Sunan at Baghdad in 241 A.H. He presented the completed compilation to his beloved teacher Imam Ahmad ibn Hanbal who was greatly pleased at this collection. He heard his hadeeth from 300 different imam's one which includes Imam Ahmad ibn Hambal. 

One of Imam Abu Dawud's special attributes were that he was able to read a book only once to be able to commit it's entire context to
memory.

Jami al-Tirmidhi 

Compiler: Muhammad ibn �Isa al-Tirmidhi (209H � 279H)

General Information: contains about 4000 ahadith. After each hadith he comments on its legal usage and the quality of its isnad. The Jami� is unique in that it has the compilers� personal notes on almost every page which mention the degrees of authenticity of the ahadith, the different versions of a single report, as well as the various currents of thought in practice in the Islamic world at his time. The Jami� is also considered as a reference in comparative Fiqh for the various schools of thoughts.

1. Full name: Abu Isa Muhammad ibn Isa ibn Sawra ibn Musa ibn Al-Dahhak

2. Grading of Hadith: Sahih (genuine), Hasan (fair), Sahih-Hasan, Hasan-Sahih, Gharib (rare), Da'if (weak)

3. Era of Compilation: 250AH-270AH

He studied Hadith under great personalities such as Imam Bukhari, Imam Muslim and Imam Abu Dawud.

The Special characteristics of al-Jami` ut-Tirmidhi

1. It is a Sunan and a Jami`.

2. Only 83 hadith are repeated.

3. Imam Tirmidhi omits the major portion of the hadith and only mentions that part which is relevant to the heading. (title)

4. After mentioning a hadith he classifies it narration (whether it is authentic or weak, etc.)

5. He specifies the narrators names, e.g. if the narrators kunya (honorific name) was mentioned, he would then mention his proper name and vice versa.

6. One hadith in Tirmidhi is a thulaathiyaat i.e. the transmitters of the hadith betwen Imam Tirmidhi and the Prophet (s) are only three.

7. Every hadith in Tirmidhi al-Jami` is "ma'mul bihi" (practised upon by the jurists.)

8. He explains the different madhahib together with their proofs.

9. He gives an explanation to all difficult ahadith.

10. His book has been set out in an excellent sequence, hence to look for a hadith is very easy.

11. There is no fabricated hadith in the entire book.

The conditions of Imam Tirmidhi in the selection of hadith According to the commentators of Al-Jami Imam Tirmidhi maintained the following conditions throughout the compilation of his book.

1. He never narrated hadith from those who fabricated hadith.

2. Allama Tahir Muqaddisi mentions that al-Jami` ut-Tirmidhi contains four types of hadith:

[1] Those ahadith that conform with the conditions of Bukhari and Muslim.

[2] Those ahadith that conform with the conditions of Abu Dawud and Nasa'i.

[3] Those ahadith that have certain discrepancies either in the sanad or matan.

[4] Those weak hadith that some fuqaha have relied on.

3. Imam Tirmidhi accepts a hadith which is narrated with the word "a'n" provided both the narrators are contemporaries.

4. After mentioning a weak hadith, he explains the state of its weakness.

5. A mursal hadith is accepted by Imam Tirmidhi when it is supported by a chain of narrators which is not broken.

Sunan al-Nissaee

Compiler: Abu Abd ar-Rahman Ahmad ibn Shu�ayb an-Nasai (214H � 303H)

General Information: the one with the fewest weak ahadith after the two sahih collections. Also known as al-Mujtaba and As-Sunan as-Sughra, it is a synopsis of a larger collection of ahadith (As-Sunan al-Kubra) which he considered to be fairly reliable. His style is a combination of the styles of Bukhari and Muslim.

An-Nasa�i was selective in his material and did not use some very important material because a narrator called ibn Lahi'ah was labelled as a weak narrator. Ibn Lahi'ah's books were burned and he (Ibn Lahi�ah) had to depend upon other scholar's copies of his work. Because these copies did not bear his name, in reading certificates, Ibn Lahi'ah was supposed not to transmit any Hadeeth from those books. That is an indication of how much care An-Nasa�i took in classifying these reporters.

Further, he tries to, for each hadeeth, record the different chains of reporting, then records a chain of reporting where some mistakes have been committed by narrators, he then explains the correct one. Thus, he records the weak Hadeeth as well as the authentic one, but he does so largely to show what effect such Hadeeth have.

Most of his hadiths were taken from Imam Ahmed Ibn Hanbal�s works. (Ibn Khalkan in Wafiyat Al-Ayan)

Sunan ibn Majah

Compiler: Mummahad ibn Yazid ibn Majah al-Qazwini (209H � 273H)

General Information: contains 4341 ahadith of which 3002 (~70%) also appear in the collections of Bukhari, Muslim, Tirmidhi, Abu Dawud and Nasai. The book is well classified, with many additions that are not found in the other 5 books. Accessing a particular hadith is fairly easy. Chapters are many and concise. However it contain a number of weak narrations and some of which are forged. Also, the criteria for selection is not mentioned.

He was born in Persian state of Dailam in the city of Qazvin in 209 A.H. His Kunyah was Abu Abdullah. It is reported by Ibn Khallikan that the Imam travelled to Baghdad, Makkah, Egypt, Syria, Kufah and Basrah along other places in order to collect hadith and learn from the great scholars of his time. The Imam benefited the most from his teacher Abu Bakr ibn Shaibah. Other scholars that influenced his work, as reported by Shah Abdul Aziz, were Jabbara ibn al Mughlis, Hisham ibn Umar and Ibrahim ibn al-Munzar. The Imam also relied on and collected ahadith from Ali ibn Muhammad Abu al-Hasan, Amr ibn Rafi, Abu Hajar, Isma�il ibn Abu Suhail al Qazwini.

According to the most preferred opinion, Bukhari has the highest status among the six authentic books of hadith, followed by Muslim, Abu Dawood, Nasai, Tirmidhi and Ibn Majah respectively. All of the sixth Hadiths were written in the period of codification � Jeel ul-Fiqhi.

The Different type of collections

Musannaf
A method of Hadeeth Collection where the Ahadeeth are collected based on topical categories, commonly being juridical, e.g., Ablution, Prayer, etc. The most famous of such a Collection using this methodology is the Saheeh of Imam Bukhari (See Musnad, Sunan below).

Musnad
A method of Hadeeth Collection, where the Ahadeeth are collated alphabetically according to the names of the Companions as narrators. The most famous of them is the Musnad of Imam Ahmed ibn Hanbal (See Musannaf above & Sunan below).

Sunan
A type of Hadeeth Collection (not a method), where an Imam collects those Ahadeeth narratedto him (or her) by his teacher, who narrated from his teacher, and so on, until the transmission is connected to a Companion and to the Messenger of Allah . This is not based on methodology (unlike a Musannaf or Musnad), but based on the transmission which starts well away from the Companions. (See Musannaf and Musnad above)

The development of Jurisprudence is divided into 4 categories

1) Jeel us-Sami' (the period of listening)
it is in this period the sahabi took all their information from the prophet pbuh.gif . it included the time of revelation and this phase provided two fundamental sources of Islamic Law; Quran and Sunnah.

2) Jeel ul Jami' (period of collection)
this period saw the collection of all that was transmitted orally and in writing. its here that the third and fourth sources for islamic rulings came about ('ijma of the companions and qiyas) which is the consensus of the companions and analogical reasoning. the likes of Imam Abu Hanifa and Imam Malik rose in this era, may Allah be pleased with them.

3) Jeel ul-Fiqhi (period of codification)
This period took the procedural aspects of the previous period and finalised the methadologies of the different sciences as well as rulings into a codified form. this period dealt with hadeeth collection and classification, through which the differences of opinions regarding hadith gradings came about.

4) Jeel ul Taqleed is a period of freezing of developmental sciences. Scholars were being persecuted, punished and killed, and thus the only way to protect themselves was to follow the works of the previous scholars, and to not develop any further works.

Bismillah irrahman irrahim

Wa'alaikum assalam wa rahmatullahe wa barakatuhu

I am sure you must have heard the saying of Imam bukhari rahimullah alyih that most authentic book on face of earth after the Holy Quran is Muatta imam malik rahimullah alyih. So why does that not come under the sahih collection?

wassalam

As Salamu Alaikum Sister Fatima

From my study of the Qur�an and Hadith, the majority of the scholars agree that the most authentic book after the Qur�an is Sahih Al-Bukhari followed by Sahih Muslim.

The seven compilers of Ahadith � Al-Bukhari, Muslim, Abu Dawud, Nasa�i, Tirmidhi, ibn Majah and Ahmad

Imam Malik is one of the four Imams of Fiqh. Correct me if I am wrong

Bro Rami, Jazakallahu Khairan

Wa Alaikum Salam

Bismillah irrahman irrahim

Assalamu alaikum

JazakumAllah khair, I have only seen an online collection and a CD-ROM for hadith for Mu'atta and its only got ahadith in it, thats why i thought its a hadith collection. So would you know whether the original one had some rulings of Imam Malik rahimullah alayh or its only ahadith and you take rulings direct from there?

And about Musnad Ahmad, does any1 know whether there is an english translation been done of that?

wassalam

Bismillah irrahman irrahim

Assalamu alaikum

JazakAllah khair brother, specially correcting that it was Imam Shafi' rahimullah alyh who said about authenticity of Muwatta not Imam bukhari rahimullah alyh

wassalam