In spite of the great amount of labour and pain borne by al-`Allamah al-Majlisi...

In spite of the great amount of labour and pain borne by al-`Allamah al-Majlisi, it should be admitted that the book is an unfinished masterpiece; since, he could not succeed in eliminating many weak traditions from his great work. Had al-Majlisi lived for another decade, he might have been successful in producing a true "ocean of light" full of precious pearls and corals and mines of pure gold.

The task of extracting its precious pearls and gold from this unfathomable ocean and clearing its treasures of their adhering mud and fungus remains for us to accomplish. **The Age of Further Research: ** After the age of al-Majlisi, another age followed in which the study of hadith made valuable progress.

The scholars of this period did not abandon the pursuits of such men as Fayd al-Kashani, al-Hurr al-`Amili, and al-`Allamah al-Majlisi; rather they adhered to this path with greater care and attention to the new sophisticated criteria of authorship. Among those who have left worthy books in the field of the science of hadith can…