Hadith Preservation
\r\nIt would take a cosmic level of cynicism to accuse Muslim scholars of feigning entirely their commitment to preserving the Prophet's Sunnah and concocting the vast body of Hadiths out of whole cloth to justify received practice. This was, of course, precisely the level of cynicism exhibited by several generations of Western scholars of Islam, many of whom claimed that all of early Islamic history was an illusion conjured up by Sunni orthodoxy in the 800s. The most recent Western scholarship on Hadiths has shown that such wide-scale forgery was highly improbable. Textual analysis and archaeological evidence can take us back reliably to within a century of the Prophet's death, and as far back as that horizon the Sunni science of Hadith transmission and law seems to have been an honest if hotly contested undertaking. As for the first crucial century of Islam, beyond its broad outlines, it lies out of historical sight. For those who ponder it, the content of its veiled chamber are determined by presupposition, whether belief in Islam or scepticism about religion, whether Sunni or Shiite.
\r\nAs Muslim scholars themselves admitted, Hadith forgery in the generations after the Prophet was widespread, and many Hadiths were certainly concocted for political or sectarian causes or in an effort to help make exegetical sense of the Quran. But we are justified in granting individual Hadiths the historical benefit of the doubt until given some reason to think otherwise. It is not unlikely that many Hadiths really can be traced back to the generation of the Companions and represent their personal recollections of Muhammad's teachings. When looking at the lengthy and unexciting chapters on ablution, prayer or inheritance in mainstay Hadith collections, it seems more plausible that the Prophet actually made many of these statements than that each Hadith was made up to suit some boring purpose.
\r\nCompiled From:
\r\n \"Misquoting Muhammad\" - Jonathan A.C. Brown, pp. 176, 177