Sulaim Ibn Qais said to Amir al-Mu’minin (‘as): I have heard Salman, Abutharr, and al-Miqdad speaking of matters regarding the exegesis of the Qur’an and the sayings and narratives of the Rasulullah (SAW). Then I hear you testifying so. I also noticed many other matters regarding the Qur’anic exegeses and the prophetic narratives in people’s hands, but they opposed them while others were forging lies willfully and interpreting the Qur’an out of their own impressions. What is the reality of this matter?
Maulana Ali (‘as) answered:
You have asked; so, listen to the answer. Certainly, what is current among the people are right and wrong, true and false, repealing and repealed, general and particular, definite and indefinite, exact and surmised. Even during the Rasulullah’s days false sayings had been attributed to him, so much so that he had to say during his sermon: “Whoever attributes falsehoods to me makes his abode in Hell.” However, many forged lies against him after his death. Those who relate traditions are of four categories, no more:
The hypocrite is a person who makes a show of faith and adopts the appearance of a Muslim; he does not hesitate in sinning nor does he keep aloof from vice; he willfully attributes false things against the Messenger of Allah—may Allah bless him and his descendants. If people knew that he was a hypocrite and a liar, they would not accept anything from him and would not confirm what he says.
Rather they say that he is the companion of the Rasulullah, has met him, heard (his sayings) from him and acquired (knowledge) from him. They therefore do not recognize his reality when they acceded to his knowledge. Allah too had warned well about the hypocrites and described them fully. He says:
“Their physical appearance attracts you when you see them and when they speak, you carefully listen to them.”
They have continued after the Holy Rasulullah as they spread in many countries. They gained positions with the leaders of misguidance and callers towards Hell through falsehoods and slanderings. So, they put them in high posts and judiciary positions, made them officers over the heads of the people, and amassed wealth through them. People are always with the rulers and after this world that they regard as their goal, except those to whom Allah affords protection. This is the first of the four categories.
Then there is the individual who heard (a saying) from the Holy Rasulullah but did not memorize it as it was, but surmised it. He does not lie willfully. Now, he carries the saying with him and relates it, acts upon it and claims that: “I heard it from the Messenger of Allah (S).” If the Muslims come to know that he has committed a mistake in it, they will not accept it from him, and if he himself knows that he is on the wrong, he will give it up.
The third man is he who heard the Rasulullah (SAW) ordering to do a thing and later the Prophet refrained the people from doing it, but this man did not know it, or he heard the Prophet refraining people from a thing and later he allowed it, but this man did not know it. In this way he retained in his mind what had been repealed, and did not retain the re-pealing tradition. If he knew that it had been repealed, he would reject it, or if the Muslims knew, when they heard it from him, that it had been repealed they would reject it. This is the third cate-gory.
The last, namely the fourth man, is he who does not speak a lie against Allah or against His Prophet. He hates falsehood out of fear for Allah and respect for the Messenger of Allah (SAW), and does not commit mistakes, but retains (in his mind) exactly what he heard (from the Prophet), and he relates it as he heard it without adding anything or omitting anything. He heard the repealing tradition, he retained it and acted upon it, and he heard the repealed tradition and rejected it. The traditions of the Rasulullah (SAW) are as same as the Qur’an in the face that some of them are repealed and some are repealing. Likewise, some of them are decisive and some are allegorical. Like the Qur’an, the wording of the Rasulullah (SAW) is of two kinds—one is particular and one is general. God the Majestic says:
Take only what the Messenger gives to you and desist from what he forbids you. (59:7).
Sometimes a man would hear him but he would not know what Allah, the Glorified, meant by it or what the Messenger of Allah meant by it. In this way the listener carries it and memorizes it without knowing its meaning and its true intention, or what was its reason. Among the companions of the Messenger of Allah (S) all were not in the habit of putting him questions and ask him the meanings, indeed they always wished that some Bedouin or stranger might come and ask him (‘as) so that they would also listen.
I used to visit him once a day and he used to keep me alone with him to plunge in everything in which he plunged. All the companions knew that the Rasulullah (SAW) did this only to me exclusively. Sometimes, he used to come to my house. Whenever I was be-fore him, he used to ask the others to leave and ask his wives to let him alone. Whenever I asked, he answered me. Whenever I kept silent or had my questions finished, he opened a matter of discussion with me. Whenever a Verse was revealed to him, whether at night or daylight, in a heaven or the earth, in the world or the world to come, in Paradise or Hell, in a plain or a mountain, or in light or gloom, he used to recite it before me, teach me its interpretation, exegesis, repealing, repealed, decisive, allegorical, particular, and general matters. He also used to teach me where and what for was it revealed until the Day of Resurrection.