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I have three questions for Yuksel: 

1. How can you claim that several thousand sahih hadiths are necessarily false while you cite only a few sahih hadiths which have debatable contents? Is this not generalization from scanty data? 

2. Why do you assume that either all sahih hadiths should be rejected or all of them should be accepted? Why not judge each hadith based on its individual merit according to all the available data about its isnad, its transmitters, and so on? 

3. Suppose we cease to use hadith as a source of information about the Prophet, his life, and his career. Then we notice that the Qur'an itself says very little about the Prophet's life. It also says nothing about how it was complied. 

The historicity of the Quran is based on hadiths. It it form hadiths that we know how the Quran was complied. It is also from hadith that we know about the life of the Prophet. 

YUKSEL: Here are my answers: 

1. If any book contains a few lies (which we have more than just "few" examples), then, the endorsement of that book is not reliable. If you see dozens of repeated fabrications introduced as trustworthy (sahih) hadith, then, how can you still rely on other narration of the same book? 

2. Judging each hadith on its individual merit may seem attractive for those who are not satisfied with God's book, but it is a waste of time and a deceptive method. If the signature of narrators (sanad) cannot provide authenticity about the source of hadith, then, our only guide to decide on the content of hadiths (matn) will be our personal wish or our current inclinations. How can we decide which hadith has a merit? How can we decide which hadiths is accurate? We may say "by comparing them with the Quran!" But, what this really mean? If it is "me" who will compare a hadith to the Quran, if it is again "me" who will judge whether it contradicts the Quran or not, then, I will end up with "hadith" which supports "my" personal understanding of the Quran. In this case hadith cannot function as an explanation of the Quran. They will be confirmation or justification of my understanding of the Quran; with literally tasteless, grammatically lame language.... Furthermore, what about hadiths that bring extra duties and prohibitions? 

3. Again, there are many hadiths about the prophet's life which you cannot accept them with a sober mind. They are narrated repeatedly in many so-called authentic books. We cannot create a history out of a mishmash of narration by a subjective method of pick and choose. We can create many conflicting portraits of Muhammad out of those hadiths. As for pure historical events that isolated from their moral and religious implications, they are not part of the religion, and we don't need them for our salvation. I never said "we should not read hadith." In fact, we can study hadith books to get an approximate idea about the people and events of those times. We can even construct a "conjecture" about the history, without attributing them to God or his prophet. Please don't forget that the "history" is not immune of filtration, censorship and distortion of ruling class. You can see many different versions of histories (!) regarding the era of early Islam . Just read Sunny and Shiite histories. 

4. We cannot disregard God's frequent assertion that the Quran is detailed, complete, clear, and easy to understand. What do you think about the verse 17:46? "When you preach your Lord, in the Quran ALONE, they run away with aversion." 

5. Hadith books are full of contradictory teachings. They eventually lead us to a sanctified and justified secterian division in the name of the Prophet. Their very nature is another proof that hadith collections cannot be divine, since God, characterize his word and religion being not having contradiction: "Why do they not study the Quran carefull? If it were from other than God, they would have found in it numerous contradictions." (4:82). This verse clearly refutes the traditional argument that hadith books contain other revelations besides the Quran, since the followers of Hadith and Sunnah wrongly attribute verses about the Quran to hadith, such as: "Your friend (Muhammad) is not astray, nor is he deceived. Nor is he speaking out of a personal desire. It is a divine inspiration." (53:2-4). Furthermore, verses 39:27-28 describes the Quran and the following verse distinguish the divine teaching from other teachings. "God cites the example of a man who deals with disputing partners, compared to a man who deals with only one man. Are they the same? Praise be to God; most of them do not know." (39:29). Obviously, hadith narrators and collections are "disputing partners," while the Quran is a consistent source. 

6. Give me one, only one "hadith" that you think it is necessary for my salvation besides the Quran. If you are not ready to discuss the necessity and accuracy of a single hadith, then please give up from your invitation for hadith and Sunna. 

DISCUSSION ON THE TOPIC

LOMAX: The bound collection of testimony from any court is certain to contain some lies and some errors. The reliability of any piece of evidence remains debatable. Where the narrators agree, where there is no irreconcilable conflict with the Qur'an, where the hadith is not offensive to tawhid, etc., we may well be justified in accepting it as reliable. 

And if a collector collects a thousand hadith and makes a few errors, neither is he to be condemned as unreliable. 

YUKSEL: Not a single court will accept the testimony of Bukhari who collected contradictory hadiths about the Prophet Muhammad, narrated from generation to generation 200 years after his departure. You try to minimize the number and size of errors. There hundreds lies, not "few errors." And they are grave ones: They attribute stupid and contradictory laws and words to God. They create a men-made religion in the name of God! They are full of insult to God and his messenger. They are not trivial, since God Almighty does not accept those "few errors" as trivial: 

". . . Who is more evil than the one who fabricates lies and attributes them to God?" (29:68) 

LOMAX: If the hadith are not mutawwatir, Edip should know by now that most scholars would say that one is free to disregard it, though not necessarily without peril. The issue Edip raises about the difficulties of decision regarding hadith also apply to personal interpretation of the Qur'an. No, the Qur'an makes it clear, we cannot disregard any evidence out of hand, not even the evidence of an unrighteous man; how much less the evidence of those against whom we have no evidence of unrighteousness or lack of caution? 

YUKSEL: First, can you please tell us how many mutawatir (accepted with consensus) Hadith are there. What are they and where are they? Second, can you give me few names of those "most scholars" who would say that I am free to disregard non-mutawatir hadiths? As far as for evidences.... Sure, we cannot disregard evidences for our daily affair, even of an unrighteous man. But, God's religion is not left to the mercy of those evidences. God explained and detailed his religion in his book, which is described as complete, detailed, and perfect. It does not contain any doubt. Furthermore, God promised to preserve it. An He did it with a unique mathematical system which hypocrites and disbelievers are unable to see. 

YUKSEL: Again, there are many hadiths about the prophet's life which you cannot accept them with a sober mind. 

LOMAX: I have answered Edip about of a number of these hadith. Certainly I personally have trouble with certain hadith; however, I must always ask myself whether or not it is my own view which is in error, rather than the hadith. Perhaps there is something I have not thought of. 

For example, there is a hadith which Edip loves to cite mentioning the drinking of camel's urine, which Edip seems to believe is particularly ridiculous. Does he base this on a scientific study of the virtues of drinking camel's urine. I think not. Nor does he ever mention that nomadic peoples, not just Arabs but including them, often consume the waste products of their animals. So "cannot accept" is definitely culturally conditioned. But no one has claimed that drinking camels' urine is required of any Muslim. 

YUKSEL: Well, the prescription of camels urine in that hadith is the minor problem. You can even find some Sunni doctors who pontificate that camel's urine is panacea for every disease. The big problem was about gouging their eyes after pruning all their legs and hands, etc. You craftily skipped this part. 

YUKSEL: Give me one, only one "hadith" that you think it is necessary for my salvation. If you are not ready to discuss the necessity and accuracy of a single hadith, then please give up from your invitation for hadith and Sunna. 

LOMAX: Edip confuses Hadith and Sunna. Hadith is only one of a number of major sources of Sunna, other major sources being the Qur'an and the practice of the community. The latter is how we generally learn to pray, by the way. 

To answer the question about necessity of hadith without going deeply into the whole concept of necessity is impossible. 

But I will answer this way: if a hadith transmits a wisdom necessary in a particular situation, and one turns away from that wisdom merely because it was a hadith (and not some other preferred modality), then one becomes culpable for failure to act correctly in the situation. This could, indeed lead to hell-fire. Of course, the same is true of the Qur'an, or even the preaching of a Christian. 

YUKSEL: If you think that some one is wrong and even misguided because of his rejection of hadith and that person challenges you with that question you don't answer like you did above. You did not or could not answer my challenge. Answering questions is not an act of writing irrelevant lines after the question. Please come to the point. 

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