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Shiavault - a Vault of Shia Islamic Books Man and His Destiny Part 14: Some Hadiths to the Contrary There are some hadiths which appear to be contrary to what we have said. But their contradiction is either superficial or due to the fact that owing to some misunderstanding they were misquoted by one of their transmitters.

In the first case the contradiction disappears when we go deep into the reports and in the second case the mistake can be rectified by comparing the hadiths in question with other reports on the subject. We give below an example of each type. Let us take the second case first. A hadith has been mentioned in al-Bukhari’s al-Sahih on the authority of Yahya bin Yamar, according to which Ayesha, Mother of the Faithful, says that she asked the Holy Prophet about the epidemic of plague.

He said: “It was a scourge sent by Allah unto whom He willed. Now it has been made a blessing for the Muslims. A person who stays in the affected town, shows patience and believes that nothing will befall him except what Allah has ordained, will receive the same reward as a martyr”. Now we quote another hadith on this very subject. It is mentioned in al-Kafi, Vol. VIII.

According to it Ubaydullah al-Halabi asked Imam Ja’far al-Sadiq (a) whether a person was allowed to move out of a place where plague had broken out? The Imam (a) said: “There is no harm. The Prophet only forbade the leaving of a place which was situated in front of the enemy position. When plague broke out there and the people began to flee from it, the Prophet said that he who fled from there, would be considered to have run away from a battlefield.

The Prophet said so because he did not want the Muslims to desert their position. It is clear from the explanation given by Imam Sadiq that the reason why the Holy Prophet forbade fleeing from plague on a particular occasion was that he wanted to impress upon the Muslims that they must stick to their duty and must not expose themselves to a bigger risk.

He did not issue a general instruction that the Muslims should not take precautionary measures against plague and should sit simply awaiting what was in store for them. A Muslim is duty bound to protect his life property. As the saying of the Holy Prophet passed through a number of transmitters, it took the shape of a general rule as we find it in its present form in al-Bukhari.