A Shi'ite Encyclopedia (chapter 9)

Subject: Re: Abu Huraira (part 3: His Mental and Physical Conditions)/3

miracle for Abu Huraira to get super memory? Now you seem to recognize your lack of knowledge. Did you know that the companion and cousin of the prophet SAAS Abdullah Ibn Abbas has got from the prophet his blessings and once sweeped his chest with his hand and prayed Allah for him saying:"

Allahumma faqqihhou fi ddini wa 'allimhou min ta'ouili l kitabi" (i.e. Oh Allah give know- ledge in the religion and make him interprete the book)?and by some miracle Ibn Abbas became Hibr l oumma (the imam of the nation),that was one of the miracles of the prophet SAAS. In almost the same way the prophet SAAS made a prayer once for Abu Huraira whn he complai- ned to him his shortage in memoizing.

: As you noted, Ibn Abbas (r) is recognised, even by other sahabah that he knew "taaweel" (interpretation) of the Quran. This is different from memorizing of it. Many people, even today, memorize the whole Quran, that does not mean the know the TRUE meaning behind all that is in it.

Ali ibn AbiTalib (as) was another who said that there was no aya in the Quran that he didn't know when it was revealed or why it was revealed and what it meant. The other Sahabah recognised this about these persons and there are (mutawatir) hadeeths supporting their knowledge.

Now, on Abu Huraira. Although no one thinks/claims that he knew "taaweel" of the Quran, you did not show any proof that he got his memory-powers after the prophet (sawaws) prayed for him. I would ask you to produce the reference(s) in that regard, preferably a mention by other sahabah on these special attributes of Abu Hurairah, as opposed to him describing himself.

I would like to make a further

correction, Abu Hurairah after less than three years with the prophet (sawaws), did not or avoided telling hadeeths during the periods of the first three "khulafaa al rashideen", at least. His hadeeth telling was mainly during Mu'awiya's time and later - this is at least 30 years after the prophet. So he kept all these 3000 +/- hadeeths in his heart without telling others about them for all this time.

The proof to what I am saying is that Abu-Bakir, Omar and Uthman (r) did not allow telling and recording of hadeeths. There is a report, in it Abu Hurairah is asked if he told such hadeeth in the time of Uthman? He said that he wouldn't dare to, and that they would have hit/spank him if he did!!

There is nothing holy about any of the personalities of the sahabah, in particular Abu Hurairah, that should prevent someone searching for the truth to investigate and re/evaluate their actions. They were human beings capable of errors at various levels, this is not to say that Allah (swt) won't forgive their errors, if He chooses.

However, if we are to follow their act, in this life, we must be clear in conscience that they don't deserve to be mistrusted, after studying the evidence. For if it becomes evident that they should be mistrusted, then one's brain (a gift from Allah) would (should) direct us not to use them as a guide, particularly, in what seems suspicious.

Subject: Jews/Christians/Muslims(Part 1: Is there any similarity?)

The following was sent a few months ago. Now it is going to continue:

The sequence of articles is important because some of conclusions are not valid until the last article.

**Sahih Muslim, Rendered into English by Abdul Hamid Siddiqi Printed at Hafeez Press, Sh.Muhammad Ashraf Kashmiri Bazar, Lahore(Pakistan) **

Chapter MCXII, titled as

Following the footsteps of the jews and the christians

Abu Said Alkhudri reported Allah's messenger (May peace be upon him) as saying: You would tread the same path as was trodden by those before you inch by inch and step by step so much so that if they had entered into the hole of the lizard, you would follow them in this also. We said: Allah's messenger, do you mean Jews and Christians (by your words)"those before you"? He said: Who else(than those two religious groups)?

This hadith has been narrated on the authority of Atab b. Yasar through another chain of transmitters.

The same hadith is given in Sahih Bukhari with a little difference of translation. Here it comes:

Dr. Mohammad Muhsin Khan Islamic University, Medina al-Munawwara

Narrated Abu Sa'id al-Khudri:

The Prophet said, "You will follow the ways of those nations who were before you, span by span and cubit by cubit (i.e., inch by inch) so much so that even if they entered a hole of a mastigure, you would follow them." We said, "O Allah's Apostle! (Do you mean) the Jews and the Christians?" He said, "Whom else?"

Also shiat has narrated the similar traditions through its own reliable narrators. As I recall, you can locate such traditions in Tafaaseer under the Sourah[^84] Aayah[^19]

Laterkabonna tabagan an tabagen Sourah: ensheghagh

O.K. Let see if anybody can go through the hole of a lizard(!!??) Since I have not seen such creature among human beings, I answer to myself that this is not possible. There is no way that even a thin man can pass through the hole of a lizard. If not, then what these traditions mean? The way that this example is given in these traditions confirms the case of impossible acts. I conclude, therefore, that if any of Jews and/or Christians have done an impossible action, the same action would be perfomed by a muslim too.

Some of you may have already been searching for these traditions since they seem very strange. Will muslim worship an idol as Jews did when they worshipped a caw figure? Will muslims kill prophets while we know that there is no prophet after Mohammad(SAS)? Then what these traditions mean? How about the miracles that Muses and Jesus performed? How about the distortion they made on their books? Will muslim change their book by their hand? Will they think that Jesus is the son of God? and thousands of these questions. One more point:

Will the sequence of events be kept in the same way?

For example, will there be Jesus after Yahya(Jashowa, I think)?

We know that it is almost impossible to imagine muslims to worship Jesus as the son of God, to worship caw instead of true God, to go for hunting on Saturday as Jews did. What I can conclude from the traditions is that the similar action will be done, but not exactly the same action. For example, it is been told that the prophet warned muslims about different interpretation of Quran:

You will not change anything inside of Quran as previously done in the bible(Torat and Enjil), but you will certainly change the meaning of aayaat(verses) of Quran.

To me, there is no difference between these two events. In both cases you can hardly detect the truth since you usually do not follow the original sources of the religion and you listen to others(scholars) instead of searching for yourselves.

There is no difference between changing the bible and misleading people through the interpretation of the Quran. What I conclude is that the similar acts would be done by muslim people. They may not kill a prophet after the prophet since there is no prophet. But it is not hard to imagine that some of them may have attempted killing their best knowledgeable men (scholars, ...)

How about the sequence of events? Surely there is no point in these two traditions that the sequence of events will be untouched. The words"inch by inch" is interpreted inside of the hadith: such that if one did XXXX, you will do XXXX too As the result, the sequence of events are not kept.

In other words, similar act to worshipping caw may not happen exactly in the time of the prophet as it happened in time of muses. However, it may happen at the end of time. Although Jesus will not appear as the prophet to introduce christianity, he will come at the end of times as narrated.

I summerize the conclusion I would like to make in this article:

1)- The very similar events would take place for Muslims people as they happened for Jews and Christians. In case that the act is possible, muslims MAY do the EXACT act as others did. (I will explain what I mean by "possible" in my next articles.)

2)- The sequence of events are not necessarily preserved. For some cases, this sequence MAY be maintained.

In next article, I will, insha-allah, talk about some attitiudes of present muslims which are attributed to Jews and Christians.