What is a Hadith?

A Hadith, is a saying or deed of the Prophet Muhammad.

The collection of hadiths forms 90 per cent of Islamic Law and is the second highest authority for Muslims after the Koran.

What do they say?

The most notorious parts of Sharia such as the injunctions to kill people who turn away from Islam or to stone adulterers are found the in hadiths rather than the Koran.

Which Hadiths will be edited out by the Diyanet?

Sayings which are misogenistic or anti-Christian will be removed from the Hadith by Turkey's highest religious authority. These are some that they intend to remove.

"Women are imperfect in intellect and religion."

"The best of women are those who are like sheep."

"If a woman doesn't satisfy her husband's desires, she should choose herself a place in hell."

"If a husband's body is covered with pus and his wife licks it clean, she still wouldn't have paid her dues."

"Your prayer will be invalid if a donkey, black dog or a woman passes in front of you."

How do we know the hadiths are what Muhammad said?

Hadiths were brought together two hundred years after the Koran, which was canonized in Medina in the 7th century immediately after the death of Muhammad. In the 9th century scholars like Muhammad al-Bukhari and Muslim ibn al-Hajjai, catalogued the enormous number of reported sayings and decided which were genuine. They examined the chain of people involved in passing on the sayings, the more reliable the people in the chain the more genuine authoritative the hadith was said to be. The plan to edit the hadiths is a dramatically progressive step and Turkey is the first country to sanction such a move.

Do they contradict each other?

Some later hadiths contradict earlier ones. In this case the earlier hadith is discounted and replaced by the later saying.