THE PROBLEM OF DEFINING AND LIMITING THE RESPONSIBILITIES OF THE MUHADDITHS

Abstract

Due to the diversity of the scientific and intellectual orientations and social needs of the regions they lived in, muhaddiths generally followed different methods in receiving, narrating, and compiling hadiths. This situation has made it difficult to make generalizations about muhaddiths and their works, and has sometimes led to prejudice and incorrect evaluations about them. In this study, common rules that must be followed by scholars in the fields of hadith receiving, hadith narration, and hadith classification have been examined, and the explanation of points that will enable maximum benefit from scholars and hadith works has been aimed. A scholar of hadith is not obligated to only receive authentic hadiths. Therefore, their general tendency has been to receive hadiths from everyone without distinguishing between weak and reliable narrators. As the muhaddith narrates, receiving and avoiding actions that would harm the continuity of the hadith is the primary duty of a muhaddith. If he adheres to this rule, it cannot be said that even receiving a narration that he knows to be incorrect would harm the integrity or accuracy of the muhaddith technically. The responsibility of a hadith narrator is to declare the chain of transmission of the hadith and to narrate it with a suitable level of accuracy. For scholars of hadith, it is important not only to narrate authentic hadiths but also to transmit hadiths with high chains of transmission and rare types of narrations that are not found in everyone.