What advice do you give to a student of hadith who cannot find shaykhs to study under? What are the books he should start with, particularly in the science of men?

The questioner : Our esteemed Shaykh, what do you advise a student of hadith who cannot find shaykhs to study under? How should he begin? And what are the books he should start with, particularly in the science of men?

The Shaykh : The best book that one should begin reading and studying in the books of men is the book of al-Hafiz al-Dhahabi mentioned earlier, namely *Mizan al-I'tidal fi Naqd al-Rijal*. Then the other book that al-Hafiz Ibn Hajar al-Asqalani appended, which he named *Lisan al-Mizan*. This is because these two books train the student of knowledge and alert him to the method of the scholars of al-jarh wa al-ta'dil (the critique and vindication of narrators) in how they would critique a narrator whom they did not live with and did not know intimately. Yet, they would either grade him as trustworthy or weak. How did they reach knowledge of his status, whether as trustworthy or rejected, without living in his time? One who looks into these two books, in particular, finds their method in reaching that. The first path that al-Hafiz Ibn Hajar and al-Hafiz al-Dhahabi used to know the status of some narrators who were not contemporaries of those who criticized them is that they would follow the statements of those who were their contemporaries. If they graded them as trustworthy, he is trustworthy; otherwise, he is not trustworthy. That is, they knew the trustworthiness of men by the first path, which is narration, just as we know today what the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) said and what he did of the Sunnah. Similarly, they knew the status of the narrators through the sanad (chain of narration), just as they knew the status of the Companions and the Tabi'un. Similarly, they knew the status of the trustworthy and rejected narrators. This is one of two paths that the student of these two books can perceive.
The other path—and it is the most important in this subject or field—is that they often mention, regarding a narrator, some hadiths that he narrated uniquely. If they say, for example, about a certain narrator: "He is not to be relied upon for his hadith," or they say: "His hadith is munkar (denounced)," or they say: "He has munkarat (denounced narrations)," they will list some of his hadiths. When the reader reads these hadiths, he truly realizes that such a narrator should not be considered trustworthy. As al-Hafiz Ibn Hibban sometimes expresses in his book *Al-Du'afa wa al-Matrukin*: "So-and-so narrates munkarat from the famous ones." Thus, he followed the hadith of this narrator, even if he was not his contemporary, and even if he did not narrate from those whose rejection he shared. He reaches the rejection of the narrator by following his hadiths. Either they are munkarat from their very origin, or there are some munkarat in their text where this narrator participated with some of the trustworthy ones in narrating the original hadith, but he contradicted them by adding an extra element in the text of that hadith beyond what the trustworthy narrators reported. In that case, they judge him as weak and describe him as having munkarat. If these munkarat are numerous, they describe his hadith as "munkar al-hadith." And if his narration of munkarat from the trustworthy and steadfast is abundant, the previous expression by al-Hafiz Ibn Hibban is used: "He narrates munkarat from the trustworthy, or mawdu'at (fabrications) from the steadfast," and the like. You will find this style in these two books, and from it, the student of this science is established in knowing how the scholars of hadith in the past were able to know the trustworthiness or weakness of a man without sharing his time or narrating from him.
This subject reminds me of something that must be mentioned on this occasion: that the Western Orientalist scholars, when they studied the science of hadith—which is a science unique to the Muslims, as these strangers to Islam, indeed the disbelievers in the religion of Islam, have witnessed that the Islamic nation is unique in the science of narration compared to other nations—there is no wonder in that. Some of the early Imams, and I think it is Abdullah ibn al-Mubarak, said: "The sanad is part of the religion, and were it not for the sanad, it would not be known what he (peace and blessings be upon him) said from what he did not say." Therefore, the Islamic Shari'ah is distinguished by this sanad, which enabled them to distinguish weak hadiths from authentic hadiths. While other nations, led by the Jews and the Christians, cannot distinguish what is authentic from their prophets, particularly from the one who spoke with Allah, Musa, and from Isa (peace be upon him). Therefore, their religion contains what is authentic and established, and what is false and clearly false. We are not going to elaborate on this reason, but we say: some Orientalists have recognized this virtue by which the Islamic nation is distinguished, so they studied the science of hadith and came up with two terms. They boasted of expressing a term they coined that preceded the scholars of Islam. The scholars of Islam say: Hadith is criticized from two aspects: from the aspect of the sanad and from the aspect of the matn (text). For that reason, we mentioned to you among the benefits of the book *Lisan al-Mizan* and *Al-Mizan* by al-Dhahabi that they mention samples of the narrations of the subject and take his weakness from looking at the texts of his narrations; they say of him: "He is munkar al-hadith." This is known to the scholars of Muslims, because the criticism of hadith is sometimes from the aspect of the sanad and sometimes from the aspect of the matn. Among the categories of matn criticism—and this is a sensitive point that those who desire to seek this knowledge must be aware of—is the shadhdh (anomalous) hadith. Because the shadhdh hadith is what a trustworthy narrator narrates uniquely; if he had not contradicted someone more trustworthy than him, his hadith would have been authentic. But when he contradicted the trustworthy ones in its text, they said that this hadith, due to its anomaly, is not to be used as evidence.
So, if we mention to you what some Orientalists brought as a new expression replacing the old Islamic expression "criticism of the sanad and criticism of the matn"; they said, in place of criticism of the sanad, "external criticism," and in place of criticism of the matn, "internal criticism." Then, at this specific point—which is criticism of the matn—they took issue with the scholars of Islam—they claimed thus—that the scholars of Islam did not concern themselves with criticism of the matn, i.e., internal criticism in their terminology, as they concerned themselves with criticism of the sanad, i.e., external criticism in their terminology. This has a perspective for them; but the truth is without doubt or ambiguity. This is because the Europeans, when they did not believe in Allah, the Book of Allah, or the hadith of the Messenger of Allah—for if they praised him, the limit of their statement about him is that he was a genius who was able to gather the Arabs around him, and so on—but they do not believe that he was revealed to from the sky, and that Allah (Mighty and Majestic) revealed to him words and hadiths, whether in the Sunnah or in the Qur'an. There are matters in the Sunnah, as there are in the Qur'an, that relate to knowledge of the unseen. And this is the first condition of faith, as He (Glorified and Exalted is He) said: . The first condition for every believer is to believe in the unseen. So it is self-evident that these disbelievers do not believe in anything called the unseen. Therefore, they subject not only the Prophetic hadiths, but also the Qur'an—which is mass-transmitted to the Muslims—to internal criticism, as they claim. They take from it what they wish and leave what they wish. By analogy with this action of theirs, which is not based on belief in the Book of Allah and that it is revelation from Allah, from which falsehood does not come from before it or from behind it, and likewise they did not believe in the Sunnah of the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him), they expanded on internal criticism and accused the scholars of Muslims of not concerning themselves with internal criticism.
The answer is that the science of al-jarh wa al-ta'dil (the critique and vindication of narrators) was established on internal criticism; it was established on the criticism of the text (matn). Therefore, narrators were weakened either due to denunciation (nukrah) or anomaly (shudhdh). As for the fact that Muslim scholars did not expand into internal criticism, that is because they believe in the unseen (ghayb). Their belief in it—peace and blessings be upon him—is not like their belief in him as a genius who might err or be correct, or who might speak for political reasons rather than for the sake of truth. Therefore, they rationalize that when the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) gathered the Arabs around the Qur'an and the Sunnah, he was lying to the people that he was being revealed to from the sky, in order to be able to attract them and gather them around him. And he was able to do that. But this is the difference between the believer and the disbeliever. The believer testifies that Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah, unlike the hypocrites and the disbelievers.
So, I want you to know from this statement that if you read in some of the modern research today that some Orientalists criticize the hadith scholars for not focusing on the criticism of the text, that is a lie. Rather, it is they who established the criticism of the text and, based on this criticism, declared many narrators defective; because it became clear to them that they had erred in their narration of some of his hadiths.
In the conclusion of this answer, I mention that Imam Ibn al-Qayyim al-Jawziyyah (may Allah have mercy on him) was asked in his treatise "al-Manar," the beautiful treatise that collected general rules regarding hadiths that are not authentic. He mentioned a specific chapter that he directed at himself, saying: "If it is said: Is it possible to know a fabricated hadith without referring to the chain of narration (isnad) of the hadith?" He answered: "Yes, it is possible for one who has studied the Sunnah in a way that the Sunnah flows in his veins like blood, and who has developed a special taste for knowing the sweetness and smoothness of the tongue of the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) and his speech. Such a person can judge that the Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him) disowns the hadith and did not say it, without referring to the chain of narration."
The truth is that people differ in this field; some are verbose, some are concise, and some err due to their closeness to the Sunnah of the Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him), or... in it, or their distance from it. This is the end of this advice.