Comment by Hasan Jawaid on May 15, 2015 at 12:05pm

Makes perfect sense. What's wrong with it? A little search about the birth of most of historians who are claimed to be from prophet's (PBUH) time would reveal the truth. Quran, time and again, emphasize how important it is to ponder. As a matter of fact at places Quran has stated that it is meant for the nations who ponder, not for everyone. Not sure of the dates though but books on muslim history/hadith, related to prophet (pbuh), actually began to appear as the study of genealogy gained prominence from somewhere around A.D. 719 to 816. 

Comment by Riaz Haq on November 7, 2017 at 10:56am

#Saudi Money Fuels the #Tech Industry in #SiliconValley. #Twitter #Facebook #Uber #WeWork The New York Times

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/06/technology/unsavory-sources-mone...

We need to talk about the tsunami of questionable money crashing into the tech industry.

We should talk about it because that money is suddenly in the news, inconveniently out in the open in an industry that has preferred to keep its connection to petromonarchs and other strongmen on the down low.

The news started surfacing over the weekend, when Saudi Arabia arrested a passel of princes, including Alwaleed bin Talal, the billionaire tech investor who has large holdings in Apple, Twitter and Lyft. The arrests, part of what the Saudis called a corruption crackdown, opened up a chasm under the tech industry’s justification for taking money from the religious monarchy.


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Unsurprisingly, this is not a topic many people want to talk about. SoftBank, the Japanese conglomerate that runs the $100 billion Vision Fund, which is shelling out eye-popping investments in tech companies, declined to comment for this column. Nearly half of the Vision Fund, about $45 billion, comes from the Saudi Public Investment Fund.

WeWork and Slack, two prominent start-ups that have received recent investments from the Vision Fund, also declined to comment. So did Uber, which garnered a $3.5 billion investment from the Public Investment Fund in 2016, and which is in talks to receive a big investment from the SoftBank fund. The Public Investment Fund also did not return a request for comment.

Twitter, which got a $300 million investment from Prince Alwaleed’s Kingdom Holding Company in 2011 — around the same time that it was talking up its role in the Arab Spring — declined to comment on his arrest. Lyft, which received $105 million from Prince Alwaleed in 2015, also declined to comment.

Privately, several founders, investors and others at tech companies who have taken money from the Saudi government or prominent members of the royal family did offer insight into their thinking. Prince Alwaleed, some pointed out, was not aligned with the Saudi government — his arrest by the government underscores this — and he has advocated for some progressive reforms, including giving women the right to drive, a restriction that the kingdom says will be lifted next year.

The founders and investors also brought up the Saudi government’s supposed push for modernization. The Saudis have outlined a long-term plan, Vision 2030, that calls for a reduction in the state’s dependence on oil and a gradual loosening on economic and social restrictions, including a call for greater numbers of women to enter the work force. The gauzy vision allows tech companies to claim to be part of the solution in Saudi Arabia rather than part the problem: Sure, they are taking money from one of the world’s least transparent and most undemocratic regimes, but it’s the part of the government that wants to do better.

Another mitigating factor, for some, is the sometimes indirect nature of the Saudi investments. When the SoftBank Vision Fund invests tens of millions or billions into a tech company, it’s true that half of that money is coming from Saudi Arabia. But it’s SoftBank that has control over the course of the investment and communicates with founders. The passive nature of the Saudi investment in SoftBank’s fund thus allows founders to sleep better at night.

On the other hand, it also has a tendency to sweep the Saudi money under the rug. When SoftBank invests in a company, the Saudi connection is not always made clear to employees and customers. You get to enjoy the convenience of your WeWork without having to confront its place in the Saudi government’s portfolio.

Comment by Riaz Haq on July 9, 2023 at 9:55am

Saudi documenting Hadith to stop misuse by Islamic radicals, terrorists

https://www.awazthevoice.in/world-news/saudi-documenting-hadith-to-...

The Hadith documentation project is ordered by Crown Prince Mohammad Bin Salman who believes that in the absence of this, the plethora of hadith in circulation are liable to be misused by terrorists and extremists.

The outcome of this project will have far-reaching implications in the Islamic world. It may be recalled that the death punishment for blasphemy prevalent in countries like Pakistan and radicals asking for beheading people for the same in India is justified by them on the basis of Hadith as Quran doesn’t ordain these harsh retributions.

A year ago in an interview with The Atlantic, an American magazine, MBS claimed that the misuse of hadith had become the key reason for division in the Muslim world into extremist and peaceful people.

“You have tens of thousands of Hadith. And, you know, the massive majority, are not proven and are being used by many people as the way to justify doing what they are doing. For example, Al-Qaeda followers, ISIS followers, they are using Hadith which are very weak, not proven to be true Hadith, to propagate their ideology.” The Crown Prince said.

Explaining it, he said: God and the Qur’an tell us to follow the Prophet’s teachings. At the Prophet's time, people were writing down the Qur’an, and also the Prophet's teachings. At this, the Prophet ordered that his teachings should not be written down to make sure that the main base of Islam remains the Holy Quran. So when we go to Prophet’s teaching, we have to be very careful.

MBS explained that the Hadith falls into three categories: The first one is called mutawatir. It means several people heard it from the Prophet, a few people heard from those few people, and a few people heard (it) from (those) few people. And that has been documented. Those are almost super strong, and we have to follow them.

According to MBS, there are around 100 Hadith in this category and these are the strongest.

In another interview with the Saudi television channel, MBS explained, “So, when we talk about a Mutawatir hadith, i.e., narrated and handed down from one group to another group to another starting with the Prophet, PBUH, these hadiths are very few in number, but they are strong in terms of veracity, and their interpretations vary based on the time and place they were revealed and how the hadith was understood at the time.”

He said, “The second category is what we call the individual Hadith. So, one person heard it from the Prophet and another person heard it from that person, all the way to the one who documented it. Or a few people heard it from the Prophet, a few people heard it from the Prophet, and one person heard it from those few people. So, if there is a one-person link in the lineage of the Hadith, we call it one-person hadith.”

“And this type of hadith, called ahad, is not as compelling as the mutawater hadiths; the ones narrated by a chain of groups, unless paired with clear Quranic stipulations and a clear mundane or worldly good to be had, especially if it’s a correct ahad hadith,” MBS explained.

The Crown Prince said this category needed a lot of sifting and research. ‘One should study whether it is true, whether it goes with the teachings of the Qur’an if it goes with the teachings of mutawatir, and if it goes with the interest of the people. And based on that, you use it or not.”

The third one was called Khabar. Someone heard it from the Prophet, etc, etc., and among the links are some that are unknown. Those are the tens of thousands of Hadith, and that you shouldn't use at all, except in one case:

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