A Narration’s Content, Form and Network Distribution

How is the narration’s contents and form related to the expansion of the narration network? Formed with short sentences, hadiths, compositions learned by heart and stories are more amenable to being spread around in comparison to long, straight-forward texts with simple contents and texts containing legal commands. Without adding a causal or chronological tie, hadith possesses a form similar to a short episode or instant from the Prophet’s life. What did hadith scholars aim to accomplish by developing this form? What meaning does the hadith narration form carry?  Before anything else, this form of narration nurtures the identity of hadith scholars by separating them from scholars who produced other forms of narration. A disconnected, unplanned and disorderly form separates hadith reporters from other groups dealing with hadiths like biographical writers, historians, and story tellers, who present a more chronological arrangement of materials based on a logic derived from a more focused use of planning. Still, making a respected place for narrations regarding the Prophet, narrations developing like this as opposed to the empirical style of legal experts and traditionists were more attractive to the public. In this respect, the displeasure felt by some hadith scholars  against story tellers and even historians and the defensive reactions made by the others regarding history are a well-known side of Islamic intellectual history.

Chronological arrangement was not of basic interest to hadith scholars. Under no circumstances was linear time an essential part of hadith reporters of the early period, because this concept only entered Arab culture during the time of Umar, the architect of the hijri calendar.

More importantly, it can be seen that there is a striking, pragmatic concern in the form of the hadith. A disconnected narration is a “memorizable” form that is easier to recall and disseminate; it is more permanent in the memory and more suitable to the functioning of the verbal part of the brain. Thus, as the text is broken up, it will be easier to disseminate. In this respect, I think that hadith is indebted to its disconnected form for its wide dissemination. If hadith had been in the form of a long, unified, single text, only a group of distinguished scholars possessing determination and opportunity could have reached it. The most widely dispersed hadith is generally known as “mutevatir (well-known).” If this is true, then it can be assumed that reporters with memorized narrations in their store of knowledge would be more famous.