Like a chain. There really are lessons for us in just about everything in life. Today in hadith class we discussed the different classifications of hadith and their rankings. 

I’ll try not to get into the nitty gritty, but what you should know is that Saheeh ahadith (the highest grade of accepted narrations) have two forms. The first is Saheeh of the highest rank, the second is a lower rank that requires another hadith to strengthen it. In short, a hadith might be a B grade hadith, however, if another Hadith comes (same meaning or wording) which is also a B grade, or an A grade, it has the potential to lift that hadith up to an A grade as well.

Maybe I’ve lost you, but what I want to share with you is how hadith function like people. We all have chains. We are all connected or disconnected. Sometimes our connections are weak, and in between us and our Lord are a plethora of distractions and barriers. For others, their chains are incredibly strong, and some are connected directly with their Lord as if every barrier between them and the Divine was torn down. Not everyone is like the latter. In fact, many of us are similar to that low-grade hadith, a narration with a weak chain that is filled with issues. In this case, the weak chain is due to spiritual sicknesses of the heart that can only be cured by having someone else with a stronger chain come to your aid and lift you. 

I’m talking our spiritual and religious relationship with our Lord. We need people like mentors, we need guides, we need people who are a notch above us and we should never feel inferior to reach out to them. It’s okay to feel like you’re in a spiritual strut and to reach out to someone. The Prophet was the best of people and even then, God sent him a teacher in the Angel Gabriel. Musa was a Prophet that God spoke to and as you read in Surah Al Kahf, he was sent Khidr. We were never meant to go this road alone. There are people that can lift us up and make us greater, that can help remind us that God is the greatest and can help bring out the greatness in us.

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