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The present collection During the last decade Sacred Hadith have attracted considerable attention: anthologies have been made of the Sacred Hadith to be found in the general books of Hadith, as previously mentioned; old collections that had been out of print have been reprinted; studies have been written about Sacred Hadith, their competence as authorities in religious matters and their validity as proofs in legal argument, or about the guidance and instruction they contain; and translations of them into other languages have been made for the benefit of those who do not know Arabic. In all these fields, however, there is still scope for further effort, and we have thus been encouraged to produce the present collection of a number of sound Sacred Hadith, together with a translation into English of their meanings. In the preparation of it the following considerations have been taken into account: a.) that the number should be confined to forty, thereby following the practice of other compilers of short selections of Hadith who took as a guide the words of the Prophet (may the blessings and peace of Allah be upon him ): "Whosoever memorises and preserves for my People forty Hadith relating to their religion, Allah will resurrect him on the Day of Resurrection in the company of jurists and religious scholars". It was moreover felt that a reasonably limited number would provide an easier introduction to the subject for those studying it and would encourage them to extend their readings in it further, and thata judicious selectIon of forty Hadith would none the less adequately cover a number of religious fundamentals. b. ) that great care be taken in checking the Hadith chosen so that the collection might contain only those that were of sound authority. Thus, among those chosen are thirty-four Hadith that are to be found in either one or both of the Sahihs of al-Bukhari and Muslim, while the other well known collections; such authentication is, where applicable, referred to in a note to the Arabic text of the particular Hadith. When
a Hadith is to be found in more than one source, as is mostly the case,
we have first given the source from which we have taken the version
used and have then mentioned the other sources in which it appears. c) that the Hadith chosen should patently possess the characteristic of being sacred, either by the text being sacred form beginning to end, or by the presence within the Hadith of aphrase that is sacred. d) that the Hadith chosen should as far as possible illustrate the various subjects covered by Sacred Hadith so that the reader may gain a general idea of their nature and the guidance they provide. The Hadith have been arranged according to subject matter, starting with those dealing with faith and followed by those relating to religious observances, virtuous qualities and actions, martyrdom and forbearance towards what Allah has decreed, repentance and the asking of His mercy, and, finally, those Hadith that are concerned with the Day of Reckoning. The volume both opens and closes with Hadith that tell of the mercy and favour of Allah. We were further encouraged to produce the present collection, together with a translation, by the fact that, to the best of our knowledge, only two books of Sacred Hadith have been produced in English translation. These are: 1. Hadees-e-Qudsi, selected by Maulana Ahmad Saeed Dehlvi and translated, apparently from the Urdu, by Mohammad Salman. It was printed in India in 1972 and again in 1976. Containing only the English translations, the Hadith vary in the degree of their authenticity, some of them being weak. The translation is in need of proof-correctiong and revision. 2. The third section of Dr. William Graham's Divine Word and Prophetic Word in Early Islam. It contains ninety Hadith in translation, together with the original texts. While the Hadith vary in their degrees of authenticity, they are all clearly traced back to their original sources. The book was published in America in 1977. In translating the Hadith in the present collection we have followed the same procedure adopted with an-Nawawi's Forty Hadith, namely that we co-operate together, each one of us complementing the work of the other and acting as acheck on him. This system has, we hope, helped in our attempts at attaining accuracy and precision; in undertaking the translation we have consulted the most reliable commentaries. At the same time we have striven to provide a readable English rendering. In our translation of the meanings of the Sacred Hadith we have adhered closely to the original. When forced to depart slightly from a strictly literal rendering, we have indicated this in a footnote; when we felt obliged to add words to the English translation for the sake of style of clarity, we have enclosed such additions in square brackets. The word "Allah" has been retained and has not been translated as "God" ; certain religious terms such as zakat and dhikr have also been retained and explanatory notes supplied. The original Arabic text has been printed alongside the English translation for ease of refernece. The footnotes have been kept to a minimum. It is our hope that we have been able to provide the Arabic reader, as also readers of English, be they Muslim or non-Muslim, with a collection of authenticated Sacred Hadith which will serve them as an intorduction to this branch of devotional literature and will encourage them to acquaint themselves further with it. May the Almighty make it possible for us to complete the other similar translations in the field of Hadith that we wish to carry out. Praise be to Allah, Lord of the Worlds. 20th November 1979 A.D. Ezzeddin
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