Sahih Bukhari

Books of Hadith Kutub Al-Sittah

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 ("The Six Books")

• Sahih Bukhari              صحيح البخاري
• Sahih Muslim               صحيح مسلم

• Al-Sunan Al-Sughra  السنن الصغرى
• Sunan Abu Dawood  سنن أبي داود
• Sunan al-Tirmidhi    جامع الترمذي
• Sunan ibn Maja        سُنن ابن ماجه

Others with    Period (CE)

• Muwatta Imam Malik    8th–9th cent.
• Musnad Ahmad Ibn Hanbal  780–855
• Sunan Al-Darimi  868
• Shama'il Muhammadiyah (Shamaail Tirmidhi) 9th century
• Sahih Ibn Khuzaymah  923
• Ṣaḥīḥ Ibn Ḥibbān   965
• Al-Mustadrak a. Al-Ṣaḥīḥaīn  11th century
• Al-Mawdū'āt Al-Kubrā  1128–1217
• Rīaḍ As-Ṣāliḥīn  1233–1278
• Mishkat Al-Masabih 1340
• Talkhis Al-Mustadrak 1274–1348
• Majma Al-Zawa'id  1335–1405
• Bulugh Al-Maram  1372–1449
• Kanz al-Ummal  16th century
• Zujajat al-Masabih  19th century
• Muntakhab Ahadith 20th century

Sahih Bukhari      صحيح البخاري

Sahih al-Bukhari (: صحيح البخاري‎), is one of the Kutub al-Sittah (six major hadith collections). These hadith, were collected by the Persian Muslim scholar Muhammad al-Bukhari (RA), after being transmitted orally for generations.  This as one of the three most trusted collections of hadith along with Sahih Muslim and Muwatta Imam Malik. In some circles, it is considered the most authentic book after the Quran. The Arabic word Sahih translates as authentic or correct.

The actual title of the book commonly referred to as Sahih al-Bukhari, according to Ibn al-Salah, is: al-Jaami’ al-Sahih al-Musnad al-Mukhtasar min Umuri Rasooli-llahi wa sunanihi wa Ayyaamihi. A word-for-word translation of the title is: The Abridged Collection of Authentic Hadith with Connected Chains regarding Matters Pertaining to the Prophet, His practices and His Times. Ibn Hajar al-Asqalani mentioned the same title, replacing the word umur (English: matters) with hadith.

Synopsis

Muhammad al-Bukhari (RA) traveled widely throughout the Abbasid Caliphate from the age of 16, collecting those Hadith he thought trustworthy. It is reported that al-Bukhari devoted 16 years to scrutinizing the hadiths he included in his Book from a collection of nearly 600,000 narrations. Sources differ on the exact number of hadiths in Bukhari's Sahih, depending on whether a hadith is defined as a Prophetic tradition or a narration of that tradition. Experts, in general, have estimated the number of full-isnad narration at 7,397, and without considerations to repetitions or different versions of the same report, the number of Prophetic traditions reduces to approximately 2,602. At the time when Bukhari saw the earlier works and conveyed them, he found them, in their presentation, combining between what would be considered sahih (correct) and hasan (good) and that many of them included daʻīf (weak) hadith. This aroused his interest in compiling hadith whose authenticity was beyond doubt. What further strengthened his resolve was something his teacher, hadith scholar Ishaq ibn Ibrahim al-Hanthalee – better known as Ishaq Ibn Rahwayh – had told him. "We were with Ishaq Ibn Rahwayh who said, ‘If only you would compile a book of only authentic narrations of the Prophet (SAW).’ This suggestion remained in my heart so I began compiling the Sahih." Bukhari also said, "I saw the Prophet (SAW) in a dream and it was as if I was standing in front of him. In my hand was a fan with which I was protecting him. I asked some dream interpreters, who said to me, ‘You will protect him from lies.’ This is what compelled me to produce the Sahih."

Subject matter of the book

The book covers almost all aspects of life in providing proper guidance of Islam such as the method of performing prayers and other actions of worship directly from the Prophet Muhammad (SAW). Muhammad al-Bukhari (RA) finished his work around 846, and spent the last twenty-four years of his life visiting other cities and scholars, teaching the hadith he had collected. In every city that Muhammad al-Bukhari (RA) visited, thousands of people would gather in the main mosque to listen to him recite traditions. In reply to Western academic doubts as to the actual date and authorship of the book that bears his name, scholars point out that notable hadith scholars of that time, such as Ahmad ibn Hanbal (855 CE/241 AH), Yahya ibn Ma'in (847 CE/233 AH), and Ali ibn al-Madini (848 CE/234 AH), accepted the authenticity of his book and that the collection's immediate fame makes it unlikely that it could have been revised after the author's death without historical record.

During this period of twenty-four years, al-Bukhari made minor revisions to his book, notably the chapter headings. Each version is named by its narrator. According to Ibn Hajar al-Asqalani in his book Nukat, the number of hadiths in all versions is the same. The most famous one today is the version narrated by al-Firabri (d. 932 CE/320 AH), a trusted student of Muhammad al-Bukhari (RA). Al-Khatib al-Baghdadi in his book History of Baghdad quoted Firabri as saying: "About seventy thousand people heard Sahih Bukhari with me".

Firabri is not the only transmitter of Sahih al-Bukhari. There were many others that narrated that book to later generations, such as Ibrahim ibn Ma'qal (d. 907 CE/295 AH), Hammad ibn Shaker (d. 923 CE/311 AH), Mansur Burduzi (d. 931 CE/319 AH) and Husain Mahamili (d. 941 CE/330 AH). There are many books that noted differences between these versions, the best known being Fath al-Bari.

Distinguishing features

Amin Ahsan Islahi, the notable Islamic scholar, has listed three outstanding qualities of Sahih al-Bukhari:

1. Quality and soundness of the chain of narrators of the selected Ahadith. Muhammad al-Bukhari has followed two principle criteria for selecting sound narratives. First, the lifetime of a narrator should overlap with the lifetime of the authority from whom he narrates. Second, it should be verifiable that narrators have met with their source persons. They should also expressly state that they obtained the narrative from these authorities. This is a stricter criterion than that set by Muslim ibn al-Hajjaj.
2. Muhammad al-Bukhari (RA) accepted the narratives from only those who, according to his knowledge, not only believed in Islam but practiced its teachings. Thus, he has not accepted narratives from the Murjites.
3. The particular arrangement and ordering of chapters. This expresses the profound knowledge of the author and his understanding of the religion. This has made the book a more useful guide in understanding of the religious disciplines.

4.     One of the most important aspects in Sahih al-Bukhari is tarjamah al-bab or giving name of the chapter. Many great scholars adopted a common saying: "The Fiqh of Bukhari in His Chapters". Not many scholars have commented on this aspect except Hafiz Ibn Hajar Asqalani and a few others. Shah Waliyullah Muhadith Dehlawi had mentioned 14 usul (methods) to understand Abwab wa Tarajim, then added by Hind Maulana Shaykh Mahmud Hasan Ad-Deobandi to make it 15 usul. A study conducted by Syaikhul Hadith Maulana Muhammad Zakariyya had found as many as 70 usul. He wrote specifically about Tarajim Saheeh Al-Bukhari in his book, Al-Abwab wa At-Tarajim li Shahih Al-Bukhari

Legitimacy

Ibn al-Salah said: "The first to author a Sahih was Bukhari, Abū ʿAbd Allāh Muḥammad ibn Ismāʿīl al-Juʿfī, followed by Abū al-Ḥusayn Muslim ibn al-Ḥajjāj an-Naysābūrī al-Qushayrī, who was his student, sharing many of the same teachers. These two books are the most authentic books after the Qurʾān. As for the statement of Al-Shafi‘i, who said "I do not know of a book containing knowledge more correct than Malik's book," – others mentioned it with a different wording – he said this before the books of Bukhari and Muslim. The book of Bukhari is the more authentic of the two and more useful.

Ibn Hajar al-Asqalani quoted Abu Jaʿfar al-‘Uqailee as saying, "After Bukhari had written the Sahih, he read it to Ali ibn al-Madini, Ahmad ibn Hanbal, Yahya ibn Ma'in as well as others. They considered it a good effort and testified to its authenticity with the exception of four hadith. Al-‘Uqailee then said that Bukhari was actually correct regarding those four hadith." Ibn Hajar then concluded, "And they are, in fact, authentic."

Ibn al-Salah said in his Muqaddimah ibn al-Ṣalāḥ fī ʿUlūm al-Ḥadīth: "It has been narrated to us that Bukhari has said, 'I have not included in the book al-Jami’ other than what is authentic and I did not include other authentic hadith for the sake of brevity.'" In addition, al-Dhahabi said, "Bukhari was heard saying, 'I have memorized one hundred thousand authentic hadith and two hundred thousand which are less than authentic.'"

Number of hadith in his book,

Ibn al-Salah also said: "The number of hadith in his book, the Sahih, is 7,275 hadith, including hadith occurring repeatedly. It has been said that this number excluding repeated hadith is 4,000." This is referring to those hadith which are Masnad, those from the Companions originating from Muhammad which are authentic.

Interpretations to other languages

Sahih al-Bukhari has been translated into English by Muhammad Muhsin Khan under the title "The Translation of the Meanings of Sahih Al Bukhari Arabic English" in nine volumes. The text used for this work is Fath Al-Bari, published by the Egyptian Press of Mustafa Al-Babi Al-Halabi in 1959. It is published by Al Saadawi Publications and Dar-us-Salam and is included in the USC-MSA Compendium of Muslim Texts.

The book is also available in numerous languages including Urdu, Bengali, Bosnian, Tamil, Malayalam, Albanian, Bahasa Melayu, etc.<script data-ad-client="ca-pub-8283502903234555" async src="https://pagead2.googlesyndication.com/pagead/js/adsbygoogle.js"></script>