History Compilation Guide

How Historical Information is Compiled, Distorted, and Verified

Question: How is historical information compiled and distorted, and what is the general method for its verification?

Answer..!!

Alhamdulillah.!!

Esteemed readers are requested not to ignore this article thinking it is long or unnecessary, because before reading Islamic history, it is essential for us to know about these few things. If we do not have knowledge of these fundamental points, we will not understand historical events and their scrutiny. Please read and understand this series carefully.

And at the end of this series, we will be able to understand the general methodology for examining and verifying historical information, Insha’Allah!!!

In this series, we will study the basic discussions of the art of history (historiography) to understand how historical information is obtained. How is it compiled? In what form is historical information related to the era of the Sahaba (Companions) available? Has this information reached us in its correct form? What methods exist in the art of history that can be used to scrutinize this information and assess its authenticity?

How is historical information compiled?

Historical information, regardless of the era it belongs to, has a process of compilation through which it passes several stages to reach later generations.¹ These stages are:

First Stage: The occurrence of the event and eyewitness testimony

When an event occurs, it has some eyewitnesses. These people note the details of the event and then narrate it to others. If an event has no eyewitnesses, its details generally remain hidden. If eyewitnesses are present, they compile the information according to their own inclinations, interests, and temperaments. It is human psychology that a person does not remember every aspect of an event down to the minute details; rather, it is their nature to view any event through the lens of their own thoughts, ideologies, interests, and biases.

For example, if a murder takes place somewhere, we see that one witness might describe the killer’s appearance in great detail but cannot describe the manner of the killing in detail because they were not interested in that method and could not note it adequately.

Conversely, a second witness might not note the killer’s appearance in much detail but describes the manner of the killing very clearly because their interest lay in that.

Similarly, if someone who is very interested in weapons is watching the event, they will describe the details of the murder weapon in greater detail than other things. It is also possible that a person recognized the killer but provided false information about them due to personal gain or fear. This is why some disagreement in the details inevitably arises among those who narrate the same event. In this way, the first stage of compiling historical information is completed. This stage is generally completed immediately after the event and takes a few days at most.

Thus, we see in our own time that as soon as an important event occurs, local journalists and police arrive at the scene and a record is compiled. Eyewitness statements are recorded. Besides official records, reports are published in newspapers.

Second Stage: Consolidating the information

In the second stage, information is collected from eyewitnesses and recorded in one place. Statements from various eyewitnesses are written down, and all this information is gathered. If an attempt is made to compile the information correctly, the person doing so will try to collect information from as many eyewitnesses as possible. If many people witnessed an event, there should naturally be many eyewitnesses.

If an event occurred in a closed location and there were no eyewitnesses on the spot, ambiguity usually arises. Common incidents are ignored, but if a crime or an event of historical significance has occurred, it is properly investigated, and various types of evidence are collected.

Third Stage: Completing the picture

When information has been gathered to the greatest extent possible, it is used to complete the picture of the event, links are joined, and an effort is made to bring the true picture of the event to light. This process is very similar to a Jigsaw Puzzle.

Just as a jigsaw puzzle has different cut pieces of a picture that must be joined to form one image, a picture is similarly formed by listening to the statements of eyewitnesses. However, the different aspect here is that there is a possibility of more than one picture being formed. If contradictions are found in the statements of eyewitnesses, or if other evidence presents something different, it is possible for more than one picture of the event to emerge.

This is just like an optical illusion, in which more than one image can be seen in the same picture from different angles. One such illusion is given in the picture below.

(See the picture in the first comment of this post. If you did not receive the picture with this message, you can see any such picture from Google which, upon reflection, takes the form of more than one shape. For example, just as everyone gives the shining stars in the sky the shape of a circle or a triangle according to their own will.)

Look at this picture carefully. Seeing the black part, a person who eats paan (betel leaf) might say it is a picture of a spittoon.

Whereas, by focusing on the same black part, another person might say it is a picture of two men.

It is also possible that someone might declare it a wine goblet.

Forming an opinion about this picture depends on each person’s way of thinking, social background, and mental structure.

In exactly the same way, based on information obtained from historical narrations, one person will form one picture according to their way of thinking, social background, and mental structure, and another person will form a different picture.

For example, in our time, more than one explanation exists for important events. Such as the 9/11 incident, about which many Muslims say it was a conspiracy by America and the Jews. In contrast, the American position is that Al-Qaeda was responsible for it. Similar disagreements exist regarding every important event in the world.

Fourth Stage: Compiling the sequence of events into the form of history

When the events are compiled, the next stage is to describe the sequence of these events and their mutual relationship. Usually, historians do this work and write books for it. In this way, history appears to us as a continuous process. The historian’s personal inclinations and biases play their part in this regard.

For example, the wars Aurangzeb Alamgir fought with his brothers, which resulted in all of them being killed. Secular historians criticize Alamgir for this, saying, “Aurangzeb never missed a prayer, nor any of his brothers.” In contrast, religious historians favor Alamgir and justify these wars, saying it was a war of survival. If Aurangzeb had not killed his brothers, they would have killed him.

Similarly, regarding various events in Pakistan’s history, such as the establishment of Pakistan, the 1965 and 1971 wars, the creation of Bangladesh, the Afghan-Soviet war, 9/11, the Taliban-America war, and other events of this nature, different historians are seen narrating historical events according to their own biases and inclinations.

A comparison of modern and ancient methods in the arrangement and compilation of historical information

In the case of important events of our time, the stage of gathering eyewitness testimony, evidence, and testimonies is usually carried out by journalists. As soon as an event occurs, newspaper reporters and news channel representatives arrive there and record the event in the form of a written report or video.² In the case of a crime, the police do this work and provide information to the journalists. After that, the process of completing the picture takes place. This work is generally done by analysts. Analysts for various newspapers and TV channels perform this service for handsome compensation. The more important the event, the more coverage it receives. Less important events do not get much coverage. We see daily that disagreements arise among analysts in completing the picture of many events.

After this comes the stage of compiling history, which historians perform.

Usually, the work of historians happens quite some time after the event. The work of recording and analyzing events on a daily basis is done within a few days of the event, but historians do their work much later.

For example, take the incidents of the killings of famous politicians like Bhutto, Zia-ul-Haq, and Benazir Bhutto (in 1979, 1988, 2007, respectively). The reporting of these events was done immediately. Analysts have been writing about them ever since. But historians began their work much later. For instance, history books written in the 1990s contain details of Bhutto’s killing. Similarly, we find mentions of Zia-ul-Haq’s killing in books written in the 2000s. And until about (2012), no history book based on the event of Benazir Bhutto’s killing had come to our attention.

Meaning, it is known that a historian records an event in their book many years later.

In earlier times, all this work was not carried out with this level of detail and sophistication because, in that era, there were no newspapers, no TV channels, no computers, no cameras, no separate class of journalists, and no system for recording information. In the era of the Sahaba, the situation was such that even paper was not easily available; rather, it had to be imported from distant countries, which is why paper was rare and expensive. For these reasons, people used to preserve historical events in their minds.

However, great care was taken regarding the Holy Quran and the Hadiths of the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) that they began to be written down. In the second and third centuries Hijri, when paper became common, the entire repository of knowledge was compiled in the form of books.

The events of the era of the Sahaba occurred in the first century Hijri. Those who were eyewitnesses to these events, some of them narrated them to the next generation, that next generation narrated them to the generation after it, and that generation to the one after it. It rarely happened that a narrator described the entire event with full details; rather, some stated the matter briefly, and some with some detail. In this way, these events were compiled in the form of “statements” from the narrators. These statements are technically called “Riwayat” (narration), and the narrator is called a “Rawi” (narrator).³ It became a common custom in the Islamic world that while narrating any Riwayat, the entire chain (Trail) of its narrators would be stated.

For example, a narrator Ahmad heard something from Zayd, Zayd heard it from Amr, and Amr heard it from Khalid. So before narrating the report, Ahmad will say: “Zayd narrated this to us, he (Zayd) said that Amr narrated this to him, and Amr said that I heard this from Khalid.” After that, he will state the actual narration.

All this work was happening orally, or at most, someone might have written these events in their personal diary. A hundred years passed like this, and in the second century Hijri, the paper revolution occurred, the details of which we will state later. Like other sciences, the writing of books on the science of history also began.

In that era, some historians emerged who worked with extraordinary effort to collect historical narrations and traveled the Islamic world to gather whatever narrations were with anyone. These people were called “Akhbari” (chroniclers) because their job was to collect news and events.

Among these historians, especially:

• Muhammad bin Ishaq (151 AH / 768 CE)
• Muhammad bin Umar al-Waqidi (207 AH / 822 CE)
• Sayf bin Umar al-Tamimi (185 AH / 800 CE)
• Abu Mikhnaf Lut bin Yahya (170 AH / 786 CE)
• Muhammad bin Sa’ib al-Kalbi (185 AH / 800 CE)
• And Hisham bin Muhammad al-Kalbi, the son of Muhammad bin Sa’ib al-Kalbi (204 AH / 819 CE)⁴

All these historians gained extraordinary fame.

This was the same era when the experts of Hadith (who are called Muhadditheen) were also compiling the Hadiths of the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) in the same manner.

These Hadiths also existed in the form of narrations. These Muhadditheen exercised extraordinary caution in compiling the prophetic Hadiths, whereas the class of “Akhbaris” did not observe that level of caution, which is why a high standard could not be maintained in historical narrations. We will detail this further on.

How does historical information get distorted?

Keeping in mind the process of compiling historical information in the modern and ancient eras that you have studied, you can know that there are many such gaps in this entire process through which historical information can be distorted. This happens unintentionally, and it also happens intentionally. We will explain both of these matters in detail.

Unintentional distortion of historical information

You must have seen that game where a participant has something whispered in their ear, they state it in another’s ear, and that one in a third’s, but when the last person states the matter, the message has completely changed. Events that were witnessed by thousands of people are transmitted to the next generations exactly, but the correct picture of events for which there were only one or two witnesses cannot be transmitted to the next generations. We explain this with an example. Like a war that occurred. Obviously, thousands of people would have participated in it, of which, if even eight or ten narrate the occurrence of that war, sufficient authentic material for writing history becomes available to later historians. It would be possible for the historian to try to reach the truth by comparing the statements of these gentlemen. But what secret planning did a commander do while sitting with his three close associates at the beginning of that war?

This is something that is very difficult to access. Even in our Information Age, perhaps no journalist or historian can state its correct details. This is why there is no difference of opinion among historians about the major events of history, but differences often arise regarding the partial details.

As time passes, dust settles on the picture of the event, and investigation and inquiry about it become more difficult. Suppose a hundred years from now, a historian wants to write the history of our time. The journalists of our time are doing the work of reporting important events, and analysts are completing their picture. When the historian of a hundred years later writes the history of our time, it will not be possible for them to re-investigate the events because, by that time, hardly any of the event’s witnesses would be alive. Other clues and evidence would also have been lost. Only the work done by journalists and analysts will remain for the historian. If newspapers and news channels have preserved old newspapers and news videos in their archives, perhaps these will be available to the historian; otherwise, only the work of analysts will be available to this historian. It is also possible that the writings or videos of the analysts may not be found by this historian, and they will have to suffice with other resources, such as the work of previous historians.

Keeping this example in mind, you can see that even for modern historians, removing the dust from the picture of history is a difficult task. If someone is murdered in solitude at night in our neighborhood, it is very difficult for us, despite having all the resources, to reach the real culprit. How, then, can we reach the real culprit regarding a murder or other event from hundreds of years ago, when there were no newspapers, no journalists, no news channels, and no analysts? Forget computers or the press; even paper was not fully available. In today’s era, when a communication revolution has arrived, and transportation resources have been invented to such a degree that traveling from one corner of the world to another is possible in a few hours, we cannot claim that every single thing is being recorded perfectly correctly and is being transmitted to the next generations perfectly correctly. Then how is it possible to make this claim about the olden days?

Sometimes, it also happens that due to mere misunderstanding, the matter is not transmitted correctly. A person could not understand the event or matter correctly and transmitted their deficient understanding forward. Later, this thing became part of the books of history.

Intentional distortion of historical information

From the details given above, we have learned that with the passage of time, historical information is not transmitted correctly to the next generations due to mere misunderstanding, negligence, or lack of information. This process intensifies when a person or group deliberately tries to distort history for their personal or group interests. Since people are engaged in a struggle against each other for the acquisition of power in political matters, they consider history merely as their weapon and feel no harm in distorting it.

We know that in the first and second centuries Hijri, numerous political parties had come into existence. Each one of them desired to attain power. The political parties of that era cannot be compared to the parties of our time because, in that era, whoever desired power had only one path: to stage a rebellion and acquire power through fighting. Every party’s effort was to gain as much public support as possible so that political workers would be available to them. For this, every party used the weapon of propaganda to achieve its objectives. This saying of Goebbels, Hitler’s close associate and in-charge of his propaganda machinery, is very famous: “Tell a lie so many times that people believe it to be true.”

Propaganda is not Goebbels’ invention; rather, people have been acting on this saying for thousands of years, including the political parties of the first two centuries of the Muslims.

In the second century Hijri, the people who developed an interest in history-writing generally belonged to one of these parties. They collected all sorts of true and false narrations according to their political biases and wrote books on them. These biased historians were not concerned with whether the matter was authentic or not; they just had to complete their (puzzle’s) picture. For this, whatever rubbish they found, they accepted it and tried to complete the picture according to their own minds. Later, when Tarikh al-Tabari and other books were written, these same true and false narrations became a part of them as well. After that, whenever any group wants to create a picture of history according to its own ideology, it finds all the material for it in these same historical books.

We are not stating all these facts related to history from ourselves; rather, the founder of the science of history, Ibn Khaldun (732-808 AH / 1332-1405 CE), also said the same thing. In his famous Muqaddimah (Introduction to History), he writes:

Since there is a possibility of falsehood and truth in a report, there is also the possibility of falsehood, truth, and error in history. There are several reasons for errors in history:

The first reason is the difference of opinions and viewpoints.

When someone’s mind is on the path of moderation, and they hear something, they investigate it and ponder upon it until they know whether this report is true or false.

But when someone’s mind is immersed in one opinion or viewpoint, they immediately accept the report that aligns with their opinion or viewpoint as correct, because their insight is veiled by the bandage of bias and affinity, which stops them from investigation and critique. Now, they fall into error by accepting the false report and narrate this false report forward without hesitation.

The second reason is blind trust in the narrators.

That in the view of the one narrating an event, the other persons are trustworthy, and misrepresentation is not befitting of them. For this reason, he does not scrutinize their conditions based on the principles of Jarh wa Ta’dil (criticism and validation of narrators). And without investigation, he transmits their words.

The third reason is carelessness about the objective.

Many narrators are unaware of the purposes and objectives of the reports they have witnessed or heard. They narrate merely based on their conjecture and guesswork. Therefore, they fall into error.

The fourth reason is the delusion of a report being true.

This arises in several ways. Mostly, its reason is that trust is placed in the narrators. Sometimes it also happens that the reports are not matched with other external events (of that era) so that compatibility can be created between this report and other events. Due to this lack of awareness of this correlation, fabricated and concocted things also gain currency, and the distinction between right and wrong is lost. The listener narrates the report as is, whereas it is miles away from the truth due to being fabricated.

The fifth reason is the desire to please honorable and great people through flattery and to gain closeness to them.

Often, flatterers color every word of great people in a beautiful light and spread it, and thus, false reports spread in the world because man is naturally fond of his own praise. People are extremely greedy for the world and its possessions and do not desire true virtue or virtuous people.

The sixth reason, which is more important than all the aforementioned reasons, is ignorance of the conditions of that society (to which the report belongs).

Every era has a specific environment, and for every event of that era, compatibility with the characteristics of that era is necessary. If the listener of the report is aware of the demands of that environment and the specific characteristics of the events, it will help them greatly in investigating that report. …

Sometimes people believe in completely impossible and improbable reports and not only accept them but also narrate them to others. People have continued to transmit these reports from them.

(Ibn Khaldun, Muqaddimah, Vol. 1 / p. 46, Al-Kitab al-Awwal fi Tabiat al-Umran, Beirut Dar al-Fikr)

After this, Ibn Khaldun cited some examples from previous books of history, such as it being famous about Alexander the Greek that when he wanted to populate the city of Alexandria, sea monsters opposed him. He had a glass box made and descended into the sea in it. Here, he drew pictures of some demonic creatures existing at the bottom and, upon returning, had their statues made and placed on the shore. When the monsters came to create an obstacle, they got scared and ran away, and thus the obstacle to the city of Alexandria was removed. Storytellers fabricated many such tales merely to entertain people with their help. Some historians, without much hesitation, made them part of the books of history as well.

How is historical information transmitted?

1- Tawatur (Perpetuity/Recurrence),

2- Individual Reports

Information related to the era of the Sahaba, and indeed every era, is generally available to us in two forms.

One of these forms is called Tawatur (Perpetuity),

while the other is Khabar Wahid (plural: Akhbar Ahad), i.e., Solitary Reports.

In history, these two methods have been fundamentally used to transmit any type of information, whether religious or not, to other people and the next generations.

1- Tawatur

Tawatur refers to the method according to which a report is narrated by so many people in every era that there is no room for any doubt or suspicion about it. In contrast, Khabar Wahid is the method according to which a report is narrated by one, two, or a few people, and there remains room for error or doubt in their narration.⁵

An example of Tawatur can be presented thus: the World Trade Center in America was destroyed on September 11, 2001. As soon as this event occurred, its news spread throughout the world via TV channels, newspapers, and the internet. Thousands of people went to the site, saw it, and reported it. There is no disagreement among anyone in the world that this event occurred, because there is no room for any doubt. From now until fifteen or twenty years later, billions of people around the world will narrate this event to their coming generation, articles will continue to be written about this event, video films will be watched, and it will be mentioned. The generation after us will transmit this information to the generation after them through these same methods, and this chain will continue. Even a thousand years from now, there will be no doubt that on September 11, 2001, the World Trade Center in New York was destroyed by colliding airplanes. This entire process is called the process of “Tawatur”.

Information obtained through this means is final and definitive, and there is no room for any doubt about it. Thus, we can say with full certainty that the Indian subcontinent became independent in 1947, the War of Independence took place in the subcontinent in 1857, a king named Akbar ruled India in the 16th century CE, Columbus discovered America in the 15th century, Salahuddin Ayyubi fought the Crusades in the 12th century, the tragedy of Karbala occurred in the 7th century, and in the same 7th century in Arabia, Muhammad, the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him and his family), was sent, and after him, his Companions (may Allah be pleased with them) conquered a large part of the civilized world at that time. In the first century CE, Sayyiduna Masih (Jesus, peace be upon him) raised the flag of the true religion in Palestine, the Pharaoh who opposed Sayyiduna Musa (Moses, peace be upon him) in 1400 BCE drowned in the sea, Sayyiduna Ibrahim (Abraham, peace be upon him) challenged the godhood of Nimrod in 2000 BCE, and much earlier than that, a great flood came upon the earth in the time of Sayyiduna Nuh (Noah, peace be upon him). This is information that no intelligent person, in their right mind, can deny. If someone denies these facts, they can also deny the brightness of the sun, the changing of day and night, and the earth being round.

In our repository of knowledge, there is much such information that is obtained through Tawatur, and no doubt can be cast upon it. It can certainly happen that the chain of transmitting some information breaks upon reaching the next generations for some reason, and this Tawatur is broken. This is why there are differences in history regarding the existence and eras of many kings, because their information was not important enough for anyone to take pains to preserve it. In contrast, many events of the Prophets (peace be upon them) and the founders of some other religions have been transmitted with Tawatur because, in view of their importance, full arrangements were made to preserve them. This very arrangement is called Tawatur.

2- Khabar Wahid

In history, much information also comes to us in the form of Khabar Wahid (a report from one or two individuals).⁶ Its example is that an eyewitness saw the scene of the World Trade Center’s destruction. He transmitted the details present in his mind to someone else. The second person transmitted this information to a third, the third to a fourth, and the fourth to a fifth, and this chain continued. This information could include things like: he saw a person suspiciously leaving that building and running away before the planes hit, the 79th floor was destroyed first, how a certain person on the 50th floor survived, etc.

From this example, we understood that the destruction of the World Trade Center is proven by Tawatur, but its partial details are from Khabar Wahid. This is why there is a slight difference in the news of different newspapers regarding the same event, because its basis is on the observation and memory of one or two humans.

As we have stated, when our newspapers report any major event, there are some differences in the details about it among them. In the case of an accident, what was the number of dead or injured, whose fault was it in the accident—in such matters, different newspapers give different information due to the difference in the statements of the newspaper reporters, while everyone agrees that this event occurred. This thing is also commonly observed, that one person narrates the event correctly to another, but the second person, while narrating to a third, adds or subtracts something from it due to some self-interest, or merely due to negligence and carelessness. As we have stated above, in the game of whispering from ear to ear, when the original sentence is asked from the last person, their answer is quite different from the original sentence.

This is why information obtained from Tawatur in history is 100% definitive and certain (Confirm), and there is no room for any kind of disagreement. In contrast, information obtained from Khabar Wahid does not reach the level of 100% certainty; rather, some level of doubt and suspicion is found in it. This doubt and suspicion can be brought to a minimum level through methods of investigation. This is why the Muhadditheen (Hadith scholars) invented the science of Usul al-Hadith (Principles of Hadith) so that information obtained from Khabar Wahid could be vetted.

It is not possible to tamper in any way with information obtained through Tawatur, whereas facts can be deliberately distorted in individual narrations. For example, regarding our era, no one will ever be able to say that, for instance, 9/11 never happened or that America never attacked Afghanistan or Iraq.

Yes, misrepresentation can be done regarding partial details. For example, if the literature of the Americans is examined, they place the blame for 9/11 on the Muslims, whereas the Muslims place the blame on the Jews or the Americans themselves.

It is possible that this same disagreement may exist five hundred or a thousand years from now.

In the matter of Tawatur, there is one situation in which foul play can occur:

And that is for an artificial Tawatur to be created. This happens according to the principle of propaganda. For instance, if a person A is murdered today, a friend of his, B, might claim that person C was his killer. After that, he publicizes this, gives statements to the media, and gets news published in the newspapers. Believing his word, ten or twenty more people start repeating the same thing, and after five or ten years, these people become so numerous that their statement begins to be perceived as Tawatur. Later, if a historian writes in their book based on this that C killed A, the matter will spread completely, and people will believe it without hesitation.

Scrutinizing such artificial Tawatur is easy because if, in B’s era, the event is examined through means other than his claim, it will become clear that no one besides this one person is saying this. From this, it will be known that this claim of Tawatur is baseless and that an artificial Tawatur was created.

Which events from the era of the Sahaba (Companions) are transmitted through Tawatur (recurrence) and which through Akhbar Ahad (solitary reports)?

The major events of the history of the Sahaba’s era are transmitted through Tawatur, such as: Who were the Khulafa Rashidun (Rightly Guided Caliphs)? During the reign of Hazrat Abu Bakr (may Allah be pleased with him), wars were fought against the apostates (murtadin), and wars with Rome and Persia began. During the reign of Hazrat Umar (may Allah be pleased with him), Rome and Persia were defeated, and it was an era of high prosperity.7

Hazrat Uthman (may Allah be pleased with him) was an extremely kind-hearted Caliph and was martyred by rebels.8

Civil wars occurred during the reign of Hazrat Ali (may Allah be pleased with him).9

Hazrat Hasan made peace with Muawiyah (may Allah be pleased with them both), etc.10

The partial details of these same events reach us through Akhbar Ahad.

These include all kinds of narrations, both true and false.

For example, what consultations did Hazrat Ali (may Allah be pleased with him) or other Sahaba have with their companions?

In what circumstances did your (Hazrat Ali’s) bay’ah (pledge of allegiance) take place?

What were the causes of the Battle of the Camel and the Battle of Siffin? These are the very details in which we find countless contradictions and differences.

What is the importance of Sanad (chain of narrators) and Matn (text) in Akhbar Ahad?

In the science of narration, any individual report is considered to have two parts:

One part is its Sanad and the second is the Matn.

“Sanad” refers to that part in which the details of the complete or incomplete chain (Chain of Narrators) of all narrators (those who narrate the report) are stated, from the author of the history book up to the eyewitness of the event. We have given an example of this above and are stating it again here: “Zayd wrote to us, he said that he heard this from Khalid. Khalid said that he heard this from Aslam, and Aslam said that I saw this event happen: ……” After the Sanad, the Matn (text) of the narration begins, which is the main part of the narration in which the actual event is described.¹¹

As we have stated above, experts in the Historical Method analyze both the Sanad and the Matn and try to assess to what extent this narration is reliable.

Here we are detailing this same methodology so that after learning this method, it can be applied to information related to the era of the Sahaba.

What is the method for scrutinizing historical narrations?

As we have mentioned above, many people fabricated narrations for their own political interests and spread them through propaganda. Many of these narrations became part of history books, and falsehood got mixed with the truth. Now the question arises, how can this falsehood be separated from the truth so that we can reach the correct picture of the events?

It is a famous saying that a lie has no feet (i.e., it cannot stand). The one who fabricates a lie makes some mistake or another, due to which their lie is caught. A contradiction arises in their statement because the truth is always one, whereas lies can be multiple. An example of this is that famous incident in which a narrator (Narrator) stated, “I heard this Hadith from so-and-so.” A great Muhaddith (Hadith scholar) was sitting in the audience. He asked: “How old are you?” He replied: “Eighty years.” The Muhaddith said: “Then you cannot have heard this Hadith from that gentleman, because he passed away ten years before your birth.”

Similarly, during the time of an Abbasid Caliph, the Jews of Khaybar presented a document according to which the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) had granted them some rights.

A Muhaddith of the time declared the document forged as soon as he saw it, because it had the signatures of Hazrat Sa’d bin Mu’adh and Muawiyah (may Allah be pleased with them) as witnesses.

These were Companions, one of whom had been martyred before this event, and the other had not yet migrated to Medina.

Researchers in the science of history have established a methodology for this purpose, which is called the “Historical Method“.¹² We are stating the principles of this research method here with reference to its experts. For details, you can look up the topic “Historical Method” in any encyclopedia.

Fundamentally, historical information is investigated from four perspectives:

1- Source Criticism

2- Internal Criticism

3- External Criticism

4- Analysis of Historical Causes (Historical Reasoning)

Now we will explain them one by one.

1- Source Criticism

In this investigation, it is seen what the source of the historical information is and to what degree it is reliable. Is this information merely hearsay, or is there solid evidence for it? Is the source of this information a single person or multiple individuals? If multiple, is there any mutual relationship between them? Are these sources of information biased? If the same thing is emerging unanimously from many sources, then it is accepted that this event happened.

In the terminology of Hadith science, this is called “Tawatur (Perpetuity)”. For example, the occurrence of the martyrdom of Uthman (may Allah be pleased with him) or the tragedy of Karbala is proven from countless sources. If different individuals are presenting contradictory things about this event, the expert in historical research has to see which person’s account is correct. The principles for this preference are:

• If one person is an eyewitness to the event and the other has narrated it after hearing it from someone else, the eyewitness’s account will be preferred. For example, a person who participated in the Battle of the Camel, his statement will hold much more importance than that of a person born a hundred years later.
• If one person holds some kind of bias related to the event and the other does not hold a bias, the unbiased one will be preferred. For example, in a war, the words of independent observers and journalists are preferred over those of the soldiers of the warring parties.
• If a person’s account is also confirmed by other independent sources, their account will hold more importance. In contrast, if someone is merely unique in their statement and their statement is not confirmed by other independent sources, the importance of their account will be less. It is important to keep in mind that the confirming sources must be independent.
• For example, if five individuals A, B, C, D, E narrate an event. Among them, the statements of three individuals A, B, C are similar, while the statements of two individuals D, E are different from them but they agree with each other.
• Now, the statement of the first three individuals will not be preferred merely because they are in the majority. It will be seen whether they have any relationship with each other.
• Could it be that all three belong to the same political party?
• Or are B and C both perhaps students of A? If so, then their testimony will be accepted as that of one individual, not three.
• If one party’s account is confirmed by other evidence such as fingerprints, DNA, or something else of this nature, then their account will be preferable.
• If it is not possible to prefer the account of any one party, then the historian will use their intellect and adopt other methods of research, the details of which are coming next.

2- Internal Criticism

The text of the available historical narration is analyzed to see to what extent it is reliable. Since this investigation relates to the internal analysis of the text, it is called internal criticism. The following tests are performed in it:

• Is there any internal contradiction within the report that contains the information?
• The person giving the report, are they an eyewitness, or have they written this information after hearing it from someone else? If it is an oral narration, then is its Sanad (Chain of Narrators) complete or incomplete?
• Are all these narrators reliable or not?
• When and where did this person narrate the report of the event? Could it be that they are narrating the report of the event fifty years later, when its other eyewitnesses have departed from the world?
• Before which individuals did this person narrate that report? Did they want to influence them, or was the mere transmission of information their objective?
• The statement they are giving, is it rationally possible? For example, if a person of today claims that they lived in the era of the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) and narrates a Hadith, this is rationally impossible.
• The event about which that person is giving a statement, does it require any special expertise to understand it? For example, only a physician can correctly describe the illness of a historical figure.

3- External Criticism

In this type of investigation, the information is investigated using other external sources, apart from the text of the historical information. That is why it is called external criticism. It includes these tests:

• When was the information narrated?
• Was it narrated immediately after the original event or after a long time?
• Where was the information compiled? Was the information compiled in an area that was a stronghold of a biased party related to that event?
• Which person compiled the information? Did they belong to a biased group?
• Was the information obtained from a Primary Source or from a Secondary Source? If it was obtained from a secondary source, what is its status?
• Is the information in its original state, or has any change been made to it?
• Have people believed this information in this way for a long time, or has it also been denied in some era?
• Has an attempt been made to analyze this information historically before, or has there been a tendency to just accept it in devotion or bias without investigation?
• Is this information corroborated by other clues and evidence or not?

Among these, the first four principles are called Higher Criticism, and the remaining two are given the name Lower Criticism.

4- Investigation of Historical Causes and Effects (Historical Reasoning)

In this method, it is seen whether the historical information under investigation is compatible with other historical information and conditions or not.

In history, there is a sequence of events in which a cause-and-effect chain is occurring.¹³ If an event does not fit into this chain at all, its status becomes doubtful. The causes and reasons for the event under investigation are sought, then their results are pondered. If an event is unexpected, then as much information as possible is obtained about it in order to reach a conclusion.

Since Ibn Khaldun is the founder of the science of history, he has also stated this standard. He writes:

The verification of reports depends on understanding the nature of society, and this method of investigation is extremely reliable and good. It distinguishes between true and false reports. Although the truthfulness of reports is also known from the integrity of the narrators, the status of this integrity is secondary, while the investigation based on the natural conditions of society is primary. The investigation of the integrity of narrators will only be done when there is a possibility of truth in the report. When the report itself is impossible and far from reason, then what is the use of Jarh wa Ta’dil (criticism and validation). Some intelligent people have devised a method regarding reports, which is to take impossible meanings from the words or to invent some interpretation of that event by going outside of reason. In religious reports and traditions, the scrutiny of narrators is necessary so that, at the very least, there is a strong presumption of their truthfulness.

(Ibn Khaldun, Vol 1/p. 48)

Is this investigation conducted for every historical event?

The answer to this question is in the negative. The reason for this is that enough information is not available for every historical event to apply all the procedures described above. If no disagreement arises about common historical events, they are accepted without much investigation. Detailed investigation is usually for those events that give rise to a major academic, political, or religious disagreement. This is not the case for minor events. For example, where did a king stop during a journey?

What reward did he give to a person? Which woman did the king marry? Such common matters are not investigated much. But important historical events, about which there is a major disagreement, are investigated. For example, why did a major war happen? What were its causes? What were its results? Etc.

What is the difference between verification related to Hadith and history?

Since Hadith is the record of information related to the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him and his family), the highest standard of investigation is adopted in its case. The reason for this is that he himself said about himself that whoever attributes a lie to me should make their abode in Hellfire. It is not that a strict standard of investigation has been maintained for all types of Hadiths; rather, the Hadiths related to Ahkam (rulings) have been scrutinized very meticulously, while common historical events related to the Seerah (prophetic biography) have not been scrutinized as much. Yes, if a disagreement has arisen in any matter, it has been investigated in detail.

In historical events, this standard has generally not been maintained, and historians have collected all sorts of “wet and dry” (i.e., everything, good and bad). Scrutinizing the common events among them is very difficult; however, those events that have caused a major political or religious difference within the Ummah should be scrutinized in detail.

The summary of this entire series is that

• The process of compiling historical information goes through four stages:
  (1) The occurrence of the event and eyewitness testimonies.
  (2) Noting the details of the event.
  (3) Analyzing it to create a complete picture of it.
  (4) Compiling history by taking the pictures of different events.
• Historical information is often distorted due to the carelessness of narrators, non-availability of additional information, the bias of narrators, and political and religious reasons.
• The historical information that is transmitted through “Tawatur” is not doubted, but the authenticity of that which is transmitted through the reports of individuals remains in doubt. A very small part of the history of the Sahaba’s era has been transmitted through Tawatur.
• There are multiple methodologies for scrutinizing historical narrations, among which these are prominent:
  (1) Source Criticism.
  (2) Internal Criticism.
  (3) External Criticism.
  (4) Investigation of Historical Causes.
• And the last point of this series is that not all historical narrations are scrutinized; rather, only those narrations are scrutinized in which a major political, academic, or religious disagreement arises..

(واللہ تعالیٰ اعلم باالصواب)

(And Allah the Exalted knows best what is correct)

Refernce: https://alfurqan.info/problems/348

Author: IslamicHelper