Hadith of position meaning "report", "account" or "narrative". Hadith are second only to the Quran in developing Islamic jurisprudence, and regarded as important tools for understanding the Quran and commentaries ("tafsir") on it. The hadith literature is based on spoken reports that were in circulation in society after the death of Muhammad. Unlike the Quran itself, which was compiled under the official direction of the early Islamic State in Medina, the hadith reports were not compiled by a central authority. Hadith were evaluated and gathered into large collections during the 8th and 9th centuries, generations after the death of Muhammad, after the end
Introduction to the Science of Hadith well known as of late as: "Muqaddimah Ibn al-Ṣalāḥ fi `Ulūm al-Ḥadīth", "Ibn al-Ṣalāḥ's Introduction to the Sciences of Hadith". Nūr al-Dīn `Itr, in the introduction to his edition of the "Introduction", concluded that its actual name is either "ʻUlūm al-Ḥadīth" ("The Sciences of Hadith") or "Ma`rifah Anwā`i `Ilm al-Ḥadīth" ("Familiarity with the Types of the Science of Hadith"). This is based upon the author's own usage in his own introduction in addition to the usage of other scholars in the centuries after the authoring of the book. Similar to Bint `Abd al-Raḥmān, he acknowledged that the book is most