of creation, and things relating to the future and the wars, etc. These people were like Ka‘b Aḥbār, Wahb ibn Munabbah, ‘Abd Allāh ibn Salām and others. Commentaries on the Holy Qur’ān were soon filled with these stories of theirs. And in such matters, the reports do not go beyond them, and as these do not deal with commandments, so their correctness is not sought after to the extent of acting upon them, and the commentators take them rather carelessly, and they have thus filled up their commentaries with them.”33

Shāh Walī Allāh writes in a similar strain: “It is necessary to know that most of the Israelite stories that have found their way into the commentaries and histories are copied from the stories of the Jews and the Christians, and no commandment or belief can be based upon them.”34

In fact, in some of the commentaries, the reports cited do not make sense. Even the commentary of Ibn Jarīr, with all its value as a literary production, cannot be relied upon. Ibn Kathīr’s commentary is, however, an exception, as it contains chiefly ḥadīth taken from reliable collections.

Story-tellers

Yet another thing to beware of is the mixing up of Ḥadīth with stories. As in every other nation, there had grown up among the Muslims a class of fable-mongers whose business it was to tickle the fancies of the masses by false stories. These were either drawn from the Jews, Christians and Persians, with whom the Muslims came in contact, or they were simply concocted. The professional story-tellers35 seem to have sprung up early, for as Rāzī says, the Caliph ‘Alī ordered that whosoever should relate the story of David as the story-tellers relate it (reference being to the story taken from the Bible as to David having committed adultery with Uriah’s wife), should be given 160 stripes, that being double the punishment of the ordinary slanderer.36 This shows that the story-teller had begun his work even at that early date, but then it must be remembered that he was never confounded with the reporter of Ḥadīth, even by the ignorant masses. His vocation, being of a lower status, was necessarily quite distinct.