دراية الحديث
Dirāyah al-Ḥadīth
Topic
The studies concerned with the validity of the reporting of the Prophet’s words and acts, and of what is reported.
What it means
Dirāyah al-ḥadīth is the branch of study that tests the reliability of reports from the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him). Faruqi lists it among the sciences and describes it as the study of the validity of the reporting and of what is reported. Its counterpart is riwāyah al-ḥadīth, the work of transmitting the reports themselves. Its methods include examining the chain of narrators (isnād), judging the character and memory of each narrator, and comparing a report with the Quran and with other reports. The science gave Muslims a framework for sorting sound reports from weak and fabricated ones. The great collections, such as those of al-Bukhari and Muslim, were compiled using such criteria.
Often misunderstood as
That hadith were accepted without any checking, when scholars built a detailed science of verification.
Term and Arabic as listed in Ismail al Faruqi, Toward Islamic English (International Institute of Islamic Thought, 1995), p. 49, listed as DIRĀYAH AL ḤADĪTH. The definition is restated here.