Unveiling "Unveiling Islam" - References to the Hadith

One of the points I've made in discussing the Caner situation with folks is that Caner's Muslim critics have focused most of their attention on his oral presentations, rather than on his books. The Caners' book, Unveiling Islam, has a lot of great material in it. However, a question has been raised about whether the book should be considered scholarly.

In reviewing the book, I found dozens of references to the Hadith. Many of the references are (as Dr. White recently pointed out) incomplete references:

• "hadith 9.57" (pp. 19 and 187)
• "hadith 5.266" (p. 31)
• "hadith 2.460" (p. 32)
• "Hadith ... (2.375)" (p. 32)
• "hadith 2.448" (p. 33)
• "hadith 7.619" (p. 33)
• "hadith 1.35" (p. 35)
• "Hadith ... (52.42)" (p. 35)
• "hadith 7.590" (p. 37)
• "hadith 3.826" (p. 42)
• "Hadith ... (8.419)" (p. 110)
• "hadith 6.60.336" (p. 114)
• "The Hadith illustrates ... (2.486) ... (2.498) ... (2.514)" (p. 126)
• "hadith 3.826" (p. 134)
• "hadith 2.541" (p. 134)
• "hadith 1.268" (p. 135)
• "hadith 7.62.77" (p. 139)
• "Hadith 7.30, 33. Hadith chapter seven also includes ... (7.133)" (p. 140)
• "Hadith 7.64" (p. 141)
• "hadith 8.76.481" (p. 144)
• "The Hadith expounds ... (3.57)" (p. 146)
• "hadith 3.46.724" (p. 186)
• "hadith 5.716" (p. 188)
• "hadith 4.52.79" (p. 188)
• "hadith 4.53.412" (p. 189)
• "hadith 4.52.317" (p. 189)
• "hadith 5.58.240; repeated in 5.59.602" (p. 190)
• "hadith 5.59.599" (p. 191)
• "hadith 8.73.1" (p. 192)
• "Hadith 5.42.85" (p. 192)
• "hadith 9.50" (p. 192)
• "hadith 4.52.127" (p. 193)
• "hadith 4.52.85" (p. 194)
• "hadith 5.58.240; see also 4.42. This verse is repeated in 5.59.602" (p. 195)
• "hadith 9.93.549" (p. 195)
• "hadith 9.93.555" (p. 195)
• "Hadith volume 9, book 93" (p. 195)
• "hadith 9.93.519" (p. 196)
• "hadith 4.73" (p. 196)

There were also a second category of odd references:

• "Bukhari, 784" (p. 100)
• "Bukhari, 1598" (p. 100)
• "Muslim, 3785" (p. 100)
• "Bukhari, 4813" (p. 100)
• "Sahih Muslim hadith 5339" (p. 114)
• "Sahih Muslim hadith 2214" (p. 115)
• "Sahih Muslim hadith 6595" (p. 115)

Not every reference appeared to be incomplete. The following references were provided in a more complete form:

• "Hadith of Sahih al-Bukhari, explains [quotation] (hadith 1.1.3)" (p. 41)
• "Sahih al-Bukhari, Hadith, 6.477" (p. 92)
• "Hadith ... (7.590) ... (7.619) ... (4.537) ... (5.275) ... (7.636) ... (7.747)" (p. 98) (see note below about chapter 5)
• "Sunan Abu Daawuud hadith 23.3444" (p. 112)
• "Sunan Abu Daawuud hadith 41.4937" (p. 112)
• "Sahih Al-Bukhari hadith 2.21.221" (p. 116)
• "Sahih Muslim hadith 36.6631" (p. 116)
• "Book 52 of Bukhari's Hadith ... In the volume ... (4.52.42)" (p. 186)
• "Bukhari Hadith 9.57-58" (p. 249)

I had expected to find somewhere in the book a comment that "references to the hadith are references to [Sahih al-Bukhari ... or one of the others] except where indicated otherwise." However, while I found a comment that most of the translations from the Koran are from the translation by Mohammed Marmaduke Pickthall (p. 37), I did not find any such indication for the hadith.

With respect to chapter 5, however, the following indication was provided: "All the citations in this chapter come from Bukhari's version of the Hadith." (p. 96, chapter 5 extends from pp. 93-102) The chapter then goes on to state: "The translation of Sahih Muslim is a much larger collection." (p. 96) Both of these statements are imprecise. As noted elsewhere in the chapter (pp. 95-96) and even in the second statement, Sahih al-Bukhari and Sahih Muslim are collections, not "versions" or "translations." There are versions of individual statements within those collections, however, one usually speaks of the collections as collections. The term "versions" might be defensible on some ground, but the term "translations" does not seem to be defensible.

Speaking of "translations," Unveiling Islam refers to "the official English translation of the Holy Qur'an" at page 217, whereas at page 83, the book indicates "Muslims regard any translation of the Qur'an with suspicion, for the true words are impossible to fully understand except in their Arabic original." (p. 83) The latter sentence is largely true, from what I understand of Islam. The former sentence is strange. There is not just one official English translation of the Koran. At another place already referenced above, Unveiling Islam provides yet another angle: "Most quotations from the Qur'an used in this volume are from the well-accepted English interpretation by Mohammed Marmaduke Pickthall. While the text cites the Qur'an text, it is to be understood that only the Arabic text is accepted as the actual Qur'an. All other translations are regarded as interpretations of the Scripture given to Muhammad." (p. 37) This final sentence is probably just bad English, with the authors intending to say "all translations" rather than "all other translations." However, as it stands, it unfortunately conveys to the reader the same erroneous idea as "the official English translation" does.

These issues may suggest that the familiarity of the authors of Unveiling Islam was relatively low compared to scholars of Islam, while their familiarity is clearly higher than that of the typical American Evangelical. While there are many accurate statements in the book, calling Sahih Muslim a "translation" seems to reflect a basic lack of understanding of the Hadith, and saying that there is an "official translation" of the Koran is also questionable (particularly when it appears to contradict other statements in the book).

As I mentioned at the start of this article, there is a lot of good and useful information in Unveiling Islam. I also suspect that if there were many serious mistakes in the book, the Caners' Muslim critics would have brought those to light (or perhaps they have, and I am simply unaware of it). On the other hand, their popular book should be handled with caution, and it should not be assumed that because they have written this book on Islam, that makes them "experts," even though it does seem clear that we should expect them to know more about Islam than the typical "man on the street" in America.

-TurretinFan