The transmission of the consensus on the acceptance of the two Sahihs, and whether criticism of their chains or texts is accepted in them?

The questioner : In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful. Praise be to Allah, Lord of the worlds, and blessings and peace be upon the Messenger of Allah, and upon his family and companions, and upon those who follow them with excellence until the Day of Judgment. Your Excellency,The Shaykh : May Allah reward you with good. I have some issues that have become difficult for me and for others from the people of Madinah. If you would be so kind as to answer them in detail, as is expected of you, and may Allah reward you with good. One of them is regarding the two Sahihs. The transmission of the narration of the consensus on their acceptance from a group of Imams has been reported. After this transmission, some people have objected to a chain or a text in them, and some have compiled this, such as al-Daraqutni, Abu Mas'ud al-Dimashqi, al-Ghassani, and others. So, is this compilation, and is this criticism of the texts and chains in the two Sahihs, after these Imams transmitted the consensus of the Imams before them on their acceptance, a criticism of the Imams who criticized the two Sahihs, or not?

The Shaykh : There is no criticism, neither of these nor of those. There is no criticism of those who transmitted the agreement on the validity of everything in the two Sahihs, nor of those who criticized a little or a lot of what is in the two Sahihs. Even if the criticism is in both categories, meaning chain and text, it is not a criticism of these or those. In my view, there is no difference between criticizing al-Bukhari in his book or Muslim in his book, and criticizing an Imam from the four Imams of jurisprudence who are attested to for their knowledge and jurisprudence. Because all of these and those, all are from the people of hadith, and at their head are al-Bukhari and Muslim, and from the people of jurisprudence, and at their head are the four Imams, by the consensus of the Ummah, a certain consensus. It is not like their consensus that everything in the two Sahihs is valid, because the entire Ummah has agreed that there is no infallibility for anyone in the Shari'ah, in the religion, or in knowledge after the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him).
Since the matter is so, there is no criticism of these or those. Rather, the criticism is directed at one who attacks the criticism, whether of the Imams of hadith or the Imams of jurisprudence, out of ignorance or desire, or compares between them. This is the one who is criticized. If you understand this principle, we will be reassured. So, is the question: is there criticism? The answer is: no criticism, if the criticism of what is in the two Sahihs is accompanied by knowledge and the intention to clarify the truth. This is the general answer. As for the detailed answer, the truth is that one who reads the two Sahihs and is from the people of knowledge, and being from the people of knowledge requires that he does not dispense with the old scholars who studied these two books, and other books, with a scientific study free from desire and ignorance. So, for example, one who reads Fath al-Bari by al-Hafiz Ahmad ibn Hajar al-Asqalani, in which some people rightly said that he is the Amir al-Mu'minin in hadith, will find there in the two Sahihs narrations from which there is no escape for one who believes that there are many illusions and errors in them. It is known that Ahmad ibn Hajar al-Asqalani is from the later Imams of hadith, whose knowledge and specialization in this field are accepted, and no one thinks that when he criticizes a narration that came in the two Sahihs or in one of them, that he is criticizing out of ignorance or desire. Far be it from him. The same is said of Ibn al-Qayyim al-Jawziyyah and Ibn Taymiyyah, and those before them, such as al-Mundhiri and al-Daraqutni, and their like. Then, reality bears witness to what I mentioned earlier. It is not possible to say that everything in Sahih al-Bukhari is valid. This is impossible. Long ago, I read an article in the magazine al-Arab, which was, and I think it is still published in Kuwait, in which an Egyptian writer, whose name I have forgotten, 'Abd... I forgot 'Abd... what, wrote with a very large and striking title...

The questioner : ... .

The Shaykh : No, this is different from that. That was a recent title, old. The title was "Not everything in Sahih al-Bukhari is valid." It is a dangerous title, especially in a magazine that is not a scientific religious magazine. So, in this article came wonders of ignorance that indicate that the writer does not know the science of hadith at all, and does not even know the language. I remember from this article, and my memory of it is very distant, that he denied the hadith of the Lady Aisha that the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) used to have physical contact with his wife while fasting. He struck the hadith with the saying of Allah the Exalted: and he understood the physical contact mentioned in the hadith to mean the physical contact mentioned in the verse, which is intercourse. He says this hadith is contrary to the consensus of the Ummah. And you all know, if Allah wills, that the intended meaning in the hadith is mixing without intercourse. This is an example of what comes to my mind of what he denied with great ignorance. Another example, he fabricated it on al-Bukhari, and it is not in Sahih al-Bukhari, and the hadith itself is not valid. It is the hadith of Abu Talhah al-Ansari, which Abu Ya'la narrated in his Musnad, that he was seen in Ramadan and the cold came down from the sky and he was devouring it, eating it. So they objected to him, saying how is this while you are fasting? He said it is a blessing from the sky and not food. The hadith came as marfu' and as mawquf. The marfu' one, and I am one of the most knowledgeable people about it, I had extracted it in the first part of Silsilat al-Ahadith al-Da'ifah. So this ignorant man attributed this hadith to al-Bukhari, and al-Bukhari has no news of it. Then he criticized it, and it is criticized in chain and text. This is an introduction and preparation for what follows. One of the Kuwaiti Muslim writers replied to him with a letter, and it is printed: "Everything in Sahih al-Bukhari is valid." As if the intended meaning is competition and wrestling. This one who wrote the second title is exactly like the first. Both speak without knowledge. As for the first, his case is very clear. If only he had brought some examples that he admits are not valid from what the scholars mentioned. For example, I returned to the first, for example, the hadith of Ibn Abbas in the two Sahihs, he said: "The Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) married Maymunah while he was in a state of ihram." This hadith was denied by many of the early and later scholars, for example Ibn 'Abd al-Barr, Ibn Taymiyyah, Ibn al-Qayyim al-Jawziyyah, and their like. They said this hadith is one in which some of its narrators made a mistake, because it is authentic from Maymunah herself that the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) married her while they were in a state of halal. If he had brought an example like this, he would have been excused. But, glory be to Allah, due to his ignorance, he did not exemplify with what is valid, and he brought the hadith of Aisha that he used to have physical contact with his wife or his family while fasting. Similarly, this hadith is also in Sahih al-Bukhari. The Messenger (peace be upon him) said: He said: "So whoever among you can lengthen his seclusion, let him do so." These Imams I mentioned earlier, like Ibn al-Qayyim al-Jawziyyah and Ibn Taymiyyah, and I now mention with them al-Mundhiri in his book al-Targhib wa al-Tarhib, and many others, that this addition "So whoever among you can lengthen his seclusion, let him do so" is not from the hadith, but rather it is inserted into the hadith. And this is in Sahih al-Bukhari. Therefore, there is no room for saying that everything in Sahih al-Bukhari is valid. I return to the author of the letter who made its title "Everything in Sahih al-Bukhari is valid." Those who have studied Sahih al-Bukhari know that its hadiths are divided into two categories: musnad and mu'allaq. And you are aware of this. And the title of the hadith unanimously agrees that what is from the mu'allaq hadiths contains many weak things. So how can it be said that everything in Sahih al-Bukhari is valid? This is very clear that the one who says this speaks out of ignorance and Islamic emotion, which a Muslim should not fall into except with correct knowledge. But the important thing is the first category, the musnad hadiths. These musnad hadiths, I have exemplified for you with some examples. This is not equal to this. Now, and in fact, I have criticized more than one hadith from the hadiths of the two Sahihs, and I was a target of criticism from some ignorant fanatics for that article. It is agreed by the scholars to receive what is in the two Sahihs with acceptance. This is a conceded statement in general, and not in detail. Because the detail is not possible for a scholar to say absolutely. There are many very serious errors in it. If a scholar were to specialize in compiling a book explaining the illusions and errors in each of the two Sahihs, but the one who studies Fath al-Bari is sufficient for him from turning to such a work, especially since there is something more important for the student of knowledge to do. And Ibn Taymiyyah (may Allah have mercy on him) has important notes of attention, in which he touches on some things and criticizes them from what is in the two Sahihs.
By the way, I recall that when I was studying the subject of hadith at the Islamic University, we reached the chapter on anomalous narrations. We were studying from the book *al-Ba'ith al-Hathith* for the students, and I would present them with examples of hadiths on the blackboard so that the meaning would be firmly fixed in the students' minds. So I presented them with an example of an anomalous hadith, one that, as they say, kills two birds with one stone.