The Hadith Books or the Fiqh Books — Which to Act Upon?

Question

Question: Are the Sihah Sitta — “Muwatta’ Imam Malik”, “Bukhari Sharif”, “Muslim Sharif”, “Sunan Abi Dawud”, “Sunan al-Tirmidhi”, “Sunan al-Nasa’i” — fit to be acted upon, or are “al-Quduri”, “al-Hidaya”, “Munyat al-Musalli”, “Kanz al-Daqa’iq”, “Sharh al-Wiqaya”, “al-Durr al-Mukhtar”, “Fatawa ‘Alamgiriyya”, “Ma la Budda Minhu”, “Bihishti Zewar” (“Heavenly Ornaments”) fit to be acted upon? Which of these books are correct in terms of authenticity, containing truly sound hadiths?

Answer

The hadith books — “al-Muwatta’”, “al-Bukhari”, “Muslim”, “al-Tirmidhi” and the rest — are reliable, but they also contain hadiths that have turned out to be abrogated (mansukh), as well as ones that are preponderant (rajih), outweighed (marjuh), and mutually conflicting (muta‘aridh).

Source: Fatawa Mahmudiyya

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