Reasoning through Variation in Naming one of the Men of Isnād: a Theoretical Study of Models from the Musnad of Imam Ahmad

Abstract

This study deals with one of the most important issues in the science of Hadith defects, which is the issue of reasoning by variation in naming one of the men of isnād (a chain of Hadith transmitters). It is primarily concerned with providing an analytic study of some of the narrations in the Musnad (collections) of Imam Ahmad with the aim of explaining his methodology in dealing with narrations based on variation. To achieve this aim, the researcher followed the inductive approach in collecting the models of the hadiths of this study, and then the critical analytical method was applied in studying them critically. The research findings revealed the existence of some Hadiths with errors in their chains of transmission, and that such variation in transmission was not effective and it could be corrected.