al-Radd ala man kadhdhaba bil-ahadith al-sahiha al-warida fi al-Mahdi
- Author died
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- Editions
- Majallat al-Jāmiʿah al-Islāmiyyah bi-al-Madīnah al-Munawwarah
al-Radd ala man kadhdhaba bil-ahadith al-sahiha al-warida fi al-Mahdi (Refutation of Whoever Denies the Authentic Hadiths Concerning the Mahdi) is a theological and hadith treatise by the Saudi scholar Abd al-Muhsin al-Abbad, written to establish the authenticity of the prophetic narrations regarding the Mahdi and to refute those who reject them .
Background and Occasion
The treatise was written in the aftermath of the seizure of the Grand Mosque in Mecca at dawn on Tuesday, 1 Muharram 1400 AH, by an armed group that claimed one of their members was the awaited Mahdi . Following the incident and subsequent public inquiries regarding the veracity of the Mahdi traditions, Sheikh Abdullah ibn Zayd Al Mahmud, head of the Sharia Courts in Qatar, published a treatise titled La Mahdiyya yuntazar ba'd al-rasul khayr al-bashar (No Mahdi Is Awaited After the Messenger, the Best of Mankind) . In it, Ibn Mahmud rejected all narrations concerning the Mahdi, declaring them fabricated myths and arguing that early Muslims had no belief in an awaited Mahdi .
Al-Abbad authored al-Radd ala man kadhdhaba to counter Ibn Mahmud's claims, demonstrating that affirming the emergence of the Mahdi at the end of times is established through rigorously authenticated narrations and represents the consensus of classical and later Sunni scholars .
Contents and Method
Al-Abbad opens by repudiating the actions of the group that stormed the Grand Mosque, criticizing their reliance on dreams and clarifying that the circumstances described in authentic texts regarding the end of times did not match their claims . He then engages with Ibn Mahmud's treatise passage by passage, pointing out misattributions, such as Ibn Mahmud claiming that Ali al-Qari declared a narration about Isa (Jesus) praying behind the Mahdi to be fabricated, when al-Qari in fact affirmed it as established . Al-Abbad also criticizes Ibn Mahmud's reliance on rationalist authors like Muhammad Farid Wajdi, noting that Wajdi went so far as to reject the narrations of the Dajjal (Antichrist) despite their presence in the two Sahih compilations of al-Bukhari and Muslim .
In the work, al-Abbad draws upon a ten-part study he had published earlier in Dhu al-Qada 1388 AH in the Journal of the Islamic University of Madinah, entitled Aqidat Ahl al-Sunna wal-Athar fi al-Mahdi al-Muntazar . These ten points cover:
- Companions who narrated traditions regarding the Mahdi .
- Hadith scholars who compiled these narrations in their collections .
- Scholars who authored monographs specifically on the Mahdi .
- Scholars who attested that the Mahdi hadiths reach the level of mass transmission (tawatur) .
- Related narrations found in Sahih al-Bukhari and Sahih Muslim .
- Traditions preserved in other hadith compendia, along with evaluations of their chains of transmission .
- Scholars who cited Mahdi narrations as evidence and affirmed their theological implications .
- Critical discussions of figures who expressed skepticism or hesitation toward these narrations .
- Reconciliation of reports perceived to contradict the Mahdi hadiths .
- A conclusion establishing that affirming the Mahdi is part of belief in the unseen (al-iman bil-ghayb), while distinguishing Sunni doctrine from Imami Shi'i beliefs regarding the Twelfth Imam .
Publication and Reception
The treatise was published as an article in the Journal of the Islamic University of Madinah and issued as an independent book printed by Matabi' al-Rashid in Madinah in 1402 AH . Contemporary scholars, including Umar Sulayman al-Ashqar, noted it alongside Hammud al-Tuwayjiri's al-Ihtijaj bil-Athar ala man Ankara al-Mahdi al-Muntazar as among the primary scholarly works refuting modern deniers of the Mahdi traditions .
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