The Shaykh Al-Albani’s explanation of the status of isnad in our religion, and that isnad is what Allah used to preserve this religion.

The Shaykh: This Sunnah, in its three categories, has no path to knowing it except one path, which is the path of the people of hadith. In other words, it is the isnads. The method of knowing the Sunnah is knowing the isnads by which this Sunnah is narrated. You know that the intended meaning of isnad is when one of the hadith scholars says, "So-and-so narrated to me, he said, so-and-so narrated to me," until it reaches the Companion, who in turn says, "I heard the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) say, or I saw the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) do, or I saw so-and-so do such and such in the presence of the Messenger."

The questioner : ... .

The Shaykh: These isnads require two sciences to benefit from them. The first is the science of al-jarh wa al-ta'dil (the critique and vindication of narrators), which is knowing the conditions of these narrators who chain one to his shaykh, and this one to his shaykh, until the sanad, as we mentioned earlier, reaches the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him), whether by statement, action, or approval. This science of al-jarh wa al-ta'dil has dozens of books that provide biographies of the narrators of these isnads. Every narrator has a specific biography regarding his birth, his life, his shaykhs, and the narrators from him. Then, is he just? Is he not just? Is he a careful memorizer? Is he a poor memorizer? And so on. Every individual in these isnads has such a biography in the books of al-jarh wa al-ta'dil. This is the first science. The second science is being knowledgeable about the science of hadith terminology, which informs you what a valid isnad is, what a good isnad is, what a weak isnad is, what a fabricated isnad is, and what a disconnected, mursal, or connected isnad is, and so on. All of this falls under the science of hadith terminology. Whoever masters these two sciences and looks at the hadiths chained with isnads is able to say, "This is an authentic hadith, this is a good one, this is a weak one, and this is a fabricated one." But this leads to a very, very important matter, positively or negatively. Whoever knows this science is able to verify , and he is able to benefit from the one who clarified it, who is the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him). Because the hadiths narrated from the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) without an isnad, these isnads have no value. Therefore, some of the righteous Salaf said, "Isnad is part of the religion, and if it were not for isnad, whoever wished would say whatever he wished." "Isnad is part of the religion, and if it were not for isnad, whoever wished would say whatever he wished." And in the first era of history, there is a story of one of the Khawarij. You must know something, even if brief, about the sect called the Khawarij. History, or the science of sects, shows us that the Khawarij are sects, among them being the sect that began in this era to spread its ideas and misguidance, which are the Ibadis. These Khawarij are the ones who originally rebelled against the Caliph of the Muslims, 'Ali ibn Abi Talib (may Allah be pleased with him), and fought him, and he fought them until Allah (Mighty and Majestic) granted him victory over them, and none of them escaped except a few individuals. Then the matter continued from these two who escaped to those after them, and it became a school of thought and one of the Islamic sects. The point, after this brief reminder about the Khawarij, is that in the first era, one of them, may Allah guide him, i.e., he turned to the Sunnah and left the Khawarij school, and he said, advising the people of the Sunnah, "Look at where you take your religion from. Where do you take the hadith of your Prophet from? For we used to, whenever we desired something, make it a hadith." So when he records a hadith, what does he say? He says, "So-and-so narrated to me from Abu Hurayrah, that the Messenger of Allah said..." So if we do not know this so-and-so, or this narrator from so-and-so, the matter is concealed from us, and it is as they say, "under us, and we do not feel or realize it." "Look at where you take your religion from, for we used to, whenever we desired or wished for a matter, make it a hadith." If you remember the Shi'ah, and you remember the Murji'ah, and you remember and remember, you will know the importance of hadith and the science of hadith in its two sections mentioned earlier: al-jarh wa al-ta'dil and terminology. The role of ignorance regarding the knowledge of narrators was very serious, not only from those who are considered outside the Sunnah, but also from individuals who belong to the Sunnah, but whose desires differed. For example, there is an authentic hadith in which he (peace and blessings be upon him) said: I hope we do not stop here until we digress too much, because I feel that due to people's negligence of this science, we are forced to stop at many, and very many, stations, and we try not to linger in them for long, but .