Light On the Muhammadan Sunnah Or Defence of the Hadith

Famous Hadith Books

I have stated earlier that sorts of hadith (al-ahad) being: sahih, hasan (good) and da'if (weak), presenting samples of their utterances about the sahih, as it was out of scope to mention all of their sayings due to their abundance. And since they claim that the well-known books containing all these sorts being: al-Bukhari, Muslim, Abu Dawud, al-Tirmidhi and al-Nasa`i, so we should discuss briefly every one of these books. For sake of benefit, I found it better to talk about the book al-Muwatta' of al-Imam Malik, as it is the only book left for us from among the books written down during the 2nd century, and his author being of high status and having a famous school of thought. Also I shall discuss Musnad Ahmad due to its fame and its author's having a madhhab followed by a large number of Muslims.

I will start by discussing al-Muwatta' as it preceded all these books in time and compilation.