A Theoretical Approach to the System of Transmission of Hadīth Based on Probability Calculations

In Hadith terminology, we come across terms such as thiqa (trustworthy), mutqin (convincing), ‘adl (just), sadūq (veracious), matrūk (abandoned), da‘īf (weak) and so on. Each of these terms is used to denote the level of the reliability of a transmitter (rāvī) of Pro-phetic Traditions. And there is another group of terms such as sahīh (sound), hasan (good) and da‘īf (weak). When any of these terms are predicated of a Prophetic Tradition, they indicate the proportion of probability of whether a supposed prophetic tradition actually belongs to the Prophet. Examining prophetic traditions, scholars studying prophetic traditions took into account the consistency of transmitters in general terms and all different chains of transmission of a prophetic tradition. They evaluated prophetic traditions according to what these two criteria makes more probable. In this article, I propose a model to determine nu-merical values of classes of transmitters and of properties (hukm) of prophetic traditions. It will also to help us identify the most probable form of any prophetic tradition.