The
Kutub al-Sittah (
Arabic: الكتب الستة,
translit. Al-Kutub as-Sittah,
lit. 'The six books') are six (originally five) books containing collections of
hadith (sayings or acts of the
Islamic prophetMuhammad) compiled by six
Sunni Muslim scholars in the ninth century
CE. They are sometimes referred to as
Al-Sihah al-Sittah, which translates as "The Authentic Six". They were first formally grouped and defined by
Ibn al-Qaisarani in the 11th century, who added
Sunan ibn Majah to the list.
[1][2][3] Since then, they have enjoyed near-universal acceptance as part of the official canon of Sunni Islam.
Not all Sunni Muslim jurisprudence scholars agree on the addition of Ibn Majah. In particular, the
Malikis and
Ibn al-Athir consider
al-Mawatta' to be the sixth book.
[4] The reason for the addition of Ibn Majah's Sunan is that it contains many Hadiths which do not figure in the other five, whereas all the Hadiths in the Muwatta' figure in the other Sahih books.
[4]
Contents
SignificanceEdit
Sunni Muslims view the six major hadith collections as their most important, though the order of authenticity varies between
Madhhabs[5]
- Sahih Bukhari, collected by Imam Bukhari (d. 256 AH, 870 CE), includes 7,275 ahadith
- Sahih Muslim, collected by Muslim b. al-Hajjaj (d. 261 AH, 875 CE), includes 9,200 ahadith
- Sunan Abu Dawood, collected by Abu Dawood (d. 275 AH, 888 CE), includes 4,800 ahadith
- Jami al-Tirmidhi, collected by al-Tirmidhi (d. 279 AH, 892 CE), includes 3,956 ahadith
- Sunan al-Sughra, collected by al-Nasa'i (d. 303 AH, 915 CE), includes 5,270 ahadith
- Either:
The first two, commonly referred to as the
Two Sahihs as an indication of their authenticity, contain approximately seven thousand hadiths altogether if repetitions are not counted, according to
Ibn Hajar.
[7]
