Fourth sign.Part1

There is no limit to the reports God’s Most Noble Messenger (Upon whom be blessings and peace) gave concerning the Unseen through the instruction of the One All-Knowing of the Unseen. As we have mentioned the types of these reports in the Twenty-Fifth Word, which is about the miraculousness of the Qur’an, and to a degree explained and proved them, we now refer to that Word the explanation of the information he gave concerning the Unseen about past times and prophets, as well as truths concerning Divinity, the universe, and the hereafter, and will point out a few of his many correct predictions concerning his Companions, his Family and his community. But first, for a complete understanding of the subject, we will state Six Principles by way of an introduction.

FIRST PRINCIPLE

All the states and acts of the Noble Messenger (Upon whom be blessings and peace) testified to his veracity and prophethood, but not all of them had to be miraculous. For God Almighty sent him in the form of a human being so that he might be a guide and leader to human beings in their social affairs, and in the acts and deeds by means of which they attain happiness in both worlds; and so that he might disclose to human beings the wonders of Divine art and His disposive power that underlie all occurrences and are in appearance customary, but in reality are miracles of Divine power.

If, then, he had abandoned the human state in his acts and become extra-ordinary in all aspects, he could not have been a leader, or have instructed human beings with his acts, states, and conduct. He was, indeed, honoured with paranormal phenomena in order to prove his prophethood to obstinate unbelievers, and from time to time performed miracles as the need arose. But his miracles never occurred in such an obvious fashion as would have compelled everyone to believe, whether willingly or unwillingly.

For, in accordance with the purpose of the examinations and trials that man is to undergo, the way must be shown to him without depriving him of his free will: the door of the intelligence must remain open, and its freedom must not be snatched from its hand. But if miracles had occurred in so apparent a way, intelligence would have had no choice; Abu Jahl would have believed as did Abu Bakr, coal would have had the value of diamonds, and no purpose would have remained for testing and accountability.It is a source of amazement that while thousands of men of different character came to believe through observing a single of his miracles, a single proof of his prophethood, or a word of his, or through merely seeing his face, some wretches are nowadays going astray, as if those thousands of proofs of his prophethood were not sufficient evidence, although they all have come down to us through authentic transmission and with certain proofs, and have caused many thousands of exacting scholars and thinkers and different men to accept faith.

SECOND PRINCIPLE

God’s Most Noble Messenger (Upon whom be blessings and peace) was a human being; hence he acted like a human being. He was also a messenger and prophet, and with regard to his messengership, he was an interpreter and an envoy of Almighty God. His messengership was based upon Revelation, which is of two kinds:The First is explicit Revelation. In this case, the Noble Messenger is merely an interpreter and announcer, with no share in the content. The Qur’an and some Sacred Hadith are included in this kind of Revelation.The Second is implicit Revelation. The essence and summary of this is also based on Revelation or inspiration, but its explanation and description were left to the Messenger.

When he explained and described such Revelation, sometimes he again relied on Revelation, or on inspiration, or sometimes he spoke in terms of his own insight. And, when he resorted to his own interpretation, he either relied on the perceptive power given him on account of his prophetic mission, or he spoke as a human being and conformably to usage, custom and the level of common comprehension.Thus, all the details of every Hadith are not necessarily derived from pure revelation, nor should the lofty marks of messengership be sought in such thoughts  and transactions of his as are required by his participation in the human state. Since some truths were revealed to him in a brief and abstract form, and he himself described them in the light of his insight and according to common comprehension, the metaphors and allusions in his descriptions sometimes may need explanation, or even interpretation.

There are, indeed, some truths that the human mind can grasp only by way of comparison. For example, once in the presence of the Prophet, a loud noise was heard. The Prophet said, “This is the noise of a rock that has been rolling down for seventy years and has now reached the lowest depths of Hell.” An hour later the news came that a famous dissembler who had recently turned seventy years old had died and gone to Hell, thus explaining the event the Prophet had described by means of an eloquent comparison.

THIRD PRINCIPLE

If any related tradition is in the form of tawatur, it is indisputable. There are two kinds of this sort of report: one is those reports about which there is ‘explicit consensus,’ the other is ‘consensus in meaning.’ The latter is also of two kinds: the first includes those concerning which the consensus is implied ‘by silence.’

For example, if a man in a community relates an incident in front of his people and the listeners do not contradict him, that is, they respond to him by keeping silent, this implies their acceptance of the report. In particular, if that community is such as will not acccept any error, as will consider any lie reprehensible, as is ready to criticize and, in addition, shows an interest in the reported incident, the silence of that community testifies strongly to the incident having occurred.

The second kind of ‘consensus in meaning’ is that which occurs when different people relate a particular incident, for example, one okka of food fed two hundred people, in different versions-one person describes in one way, another in another way, and another in yet another way, but all are unanimously agreed on the occurrence of the incident. Thus, the occurrence of this certain incident is supported by ‘consensus in meaning,’ and is definite; its actual occurrence is not harmed by differences in detail. But apart from this, there are times when a report supplied by a single person expresses the certainty of consensus, under certain conditions. It also sometimes happens that single report expresses certainity when supported by other, outside evidences.

Most of the reports concerning the miracles and the evidences of the prophethood of the Most Noble Messenger (Upon whom be blessings and peace) that have come down to us are either of the category of  ‘explicit consensus,’ or ‘consensus in meaning,’ or ‘consensus implied by silence.’ As for the others, although they are the report of a single person, they also have the certainty of ‘consensus’ as they have received the acceptance of the meticulous authorities on Hadith. Of such meticulous authorities were those geniuses who were called al-Hafiz, who had committed to memory at least 100,000 Hadiths, who offered for fifty years their morning prayer with the ablution of the night prayer, and who produced the six accurate books of Hadith headed by those of Bukhari and Muslim. Without doubt, any report scrutinized and accepted by them cannot fall short of the certainty of ‘consensus.’ For they acquired such intimacy with the Hadiths of the Noble Prophet (Upon whom be blessings and peace) and became so familiar with his exalted style and manner that they could spot at first sight a single false Hadith among a hundred reports, and would reject it, saying, “This cannot be a prophetic tradition; it does not have his wording.” Since they were able to recognize the precious quality of the Hadith, like an expert jeweller, there was no possibility of their confusing any other word with that of the Prophet. Some researchers, however, such as Ibn al-Jawzi, went to such excesses in their criticism as to regard many accurate traditions as false.  Nevertheless, this does not mean that the meaning of every false wording is wrong; rather it means that the wording itself is not that of the Prophet.

Q u e s t i o n : What is the benefit of citing the chain of transmission of a tradition so that even if it is not called for in the case of a well-known incident they say: “So-and-so informed so-and-so, etc.”?

A n s w e r : Its benefits are many, and one is that the citing of the chain shows the concurrence of the truthful, reliable and exacting scholars of Hadith and the unanimity of the discerning authorities whose names are included; each of the scholars and authorities signs, as it were, for the accuracy of the tradition, and places his seal on it.

Q u e s t i o n : Why were the miraculous events not transmitted through numerous chains in the form of ‘consensus’ and with as great emphasis as the basic injunctions of the Sacred Law, the Shari‘a?

A n s w e r : Because the majority of the injunctions of the Shari‘a are needed by most people at most times, for they all are applicable to each individual, like an obligation incumbent on all. But not everyone needs to know of every miracle; even if he does, it suffices him to hear it only once. It is, in fact, like the kind of obligation the observance of which by some will absolve the rest; it is quite enough for miracles to be known only to some. For this reason, even if the occurrence and reality of a miracle ten times more certain than that of an injunction of the Shari‘a, it will still come to us through one or two narrators, whereas the injunction is narrated by ten or twenty persons.