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I understand the argument that the Quran is the word of God as told to Muhammad by the angel Gabriel, and, hence, enjoys divine protection and its message cannot be corrupted by mere humans. Hence, full belief in the Quran is mandatory.

But other stuff, such as hadiths, similar scriptures, folk stories, and other accounts made by so-called "scholars" are not similarly protected by the divine. They can be fabricated, untrustworthy, misleading, mistaken, and so and so forth, suffering from all the imperfections that define humanity.

So .... why do muslims believe them, especially when they are so fundamental in defining how a "proper muslim" should be, and thus paramount in the way in which a muslim lives their life?

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  • This is relevant if not covering the issue islam.stackexchange.com/questions/24773/…
    – Medi1Saif ♦
    Commented Oct 24, 2017 at 20:31
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    This line of argument is always inconsistent. You believe people who say "this is letter for letter literally what God said", but when the same people say "this is what Muhammad did and said", you call it fabrication made up by "scholars". Doesn't sound reasonable to pick and choose, and that's even before thinking about what the doctrine is.
    – G. Bach
    Commented Oct 24, 2017 at 21:57
  • @G.Bach- There is definitely a difference. But I agree that the same questions about the Hadith can be used on the Qur'an itself. We must all ask ourselves where we draw the line and what we choose to believe or not. There's always a limit.
    – PointlessSpike
    Commented Oct 26, 2017 at 11:57
  • @PointlessSpike The (in this regard) consistent lines are before the Quran and after the ahadith.
    – G. Bach
    Commented Oct 26, 2017 at 22:29

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❶ - Firstly, the same way the Qur'an reached you is exactly how the authentic hadith reached you. And some of the hadith reached the level known as mutawatir just like the Qur'an which is a higher level. This word means it reached us through so many chains and through so many varied people that it is inconceivable that they all agreed upon a lie. And likewise, the other authentic hadith reached us through similar means, which can be studied. You do not know of this, because many like you who raise objections to hadith do not know that the Qur'an reached us in the exact same way. Therefore, you cannot choose to believe in Qur'an and reject hadith, because it shows you are either inconsistent in what principles you follow, or ignorant of the way the Qur'an and hadith reached us.

❷ - Secondly, the scholars are not there to tell you what to believe, but rather to point you to the Qur'an and Sunnah. There may be and are scholars who might want blind obedience, to the point of even saying you cannot understand what they can, etc.... but this is not the purpose of scholars. Anyone will use anything they can for evil, if they have an evil inclination. But true scholars are only there to point us towards the proof of the Qur'an and Sunnah.

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