Over the past few years, a significant number of friends and students have requested a list of suggested book readings for my various classes on Hadith Studies. Others over the past few years have asked my opinion about certain works or whether they are appropriate for the level of the enquirer. Recently, I was reminded of a promise to compile a short list of works I would consider useful reading material for a student and have thus decided to take out a few minutes to compose this post, keeping in mind the various levels of readers and the need for conciseness.

An excerpt translated from the Dars-e-Tirmidhi of Mufti Muhammad Taqi Usmani. 

It is essential to learn about the different authors who narrate many of their aḥādīth taʿlīqan. We shall cite a few here.

Question:

I have read one of your recent articles and I wanted to know, what is the legal requirement for someone to be considered a knowledgeable scholar whom we can take knowledge from? Is Isnad (chain of transmission) one of the requirements and is there any evidence for this deduced from the sources?

Also, I have noticed that Isnad is not usually mentioned by the scholars as a prerequisite for someone to be considered a Mujtahid. Can one therefore be self taught?

This write-up is based on the treatise of Ḥāfiẓ Ibn Ḥajar rahimahullah.

Mishkāt al-Maṣābīh (lit. the niche of lanterns) is a hadith collection originally compiled as Maṣābīḥ as-Sunnah (lit. the lamps of Sunnah) by Imām Muḥy as-Sunnah Abū Muḥammad Ḥusayn ibn Masʿūd al-Farrāḥ al-Baghawī (d.1122) rahimahullah, a famous Tatar muḥaddith and mufassir from the senior Shawāfiʿ scholars. It was later refined and expanded by Imām Walī ad-Dīn Abū ʿAbd Allāh Muḥammad ibn ʿAbd Allāh al-Khaṭīb at-Tibrīzī (d.1248) rahimahullah, who named the revised compilation Mishkāt al-Maṣābīḥ, as we know it today.

Based on Shaykh Mufti Taqi Usmani’s notes in the introduction to Dars Tirmidhi (1/80-86), compiled by Shaykh Waqar Gulam Dastaguir and checked & edited by Mufti Muhammad ibn Adam.

Sunan Ibn Mājah is a collection of ḥadīth compiled by Imam Muḥammad bin Yazīd Ibn Mājah al-Qazvīnī (Allah have mercy on him).

Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī is a ḥadīth collection from the Kutub al-Sittah (six canonical ḥadīth collections), authored by Muḥammad ibn Ismāʿīl al-Bukhārī رحمه الله (d. 256).