Reddit reply in r/MuslimAcademics: the prophets wish to burn people due to their not — July 10, 2025 | Ali Shukri Amin

1. I quote your previous comment,

If the hadith had been fabricated as a *command attributed to the Prophet (which it was)*, the fact that traditional scholars later justified it as an exaggeration or a wish shows they themselves could not truly fathom it being a genuine command or desire.

You claimed it was perceived as a command or created as such by the anonymous fabricators. Then you said,

"I never said the hadith required Sunnis to do that (hamamtu, هَمَمْتُ means to consider)."

It's not clear to me that you understand how traditional Islamic sciences works if you think the use of language and metaphor is a "soft rejection." This is called ta'wīl. Ta'wīl is not only extensively used in hadith but also in the Qur'an. The same principles underlying ta'wīl or balāgha I am discussing here are paramount to understanding the Quran as well.

A very obvious example is Surah Muminin Ayah 27. In Arabic, it literally says, "so construct the ark using our Eyes." Based on the interpretative principles you're laying out, if Sunnis didn't take this to mean that Nuh should have physically utilized the literal Eyes of God to build a boat - they have soft rejected this Ayah.

Even if you don't want to be a traditional Sunni I think you're in need of the formal curriculum which traditional Sunnism teaches so that you have some equipment by which to engage in the texts at least at some preliminary level.

2. Just saying "the Qur'an" and "it's obvious" is not an interpretative framework. It's baffling that you would suggest all of usul al-dalil or epistemology can be reduced to "it's obvious."

The prohibition on punishment with fire was never understood universally and we have historical accounts of Ali bin Abi Talib punishing people with fire that are traceable later than the hadith of rasulAllah prohibiting people to use fire. From a secular academic perspective the historical accounts of Ali burning people are probably stronger than the hadith of rasulAllah prohibiting it.

3. What you're describing is reconciling texts they find to be historically accurate. Just because two pieces of historical evidence contradict doesn't mean they're false. We encounter this in nearly every domain of knowledge, where there are two contradictory but equally valid pieces of evidence. I think you have just unilaterally assumed that the scholars of Islam did what you described instead of actually researching their methods and various different interpretative frameworks. You're assuming that your own unawareness of their methods is superior to their knowledge of their methods.

4. The relevancy is the naieve impression you're giving of a Prophet who is only compassionate and incapable of hardship including against his followers who deviate. You have already determined who you think rasulAllah is in your mind and then are trying to reject narrations that you think don't fit that based on conjecture. If you rejected all hadith until ICMA proved it was valid, I would say you follow a secular methodology. If you rejected all hadith until sanad and matn analysis was done, I'd say you follow the Sunni methodology. You're just cherrypicking hadiths you like in an inconsistent fashion based on matn analysis. What qualifies you to do that and - again - what is your interpretative framework?

It's not clear to me that you understand the traditional Islamic sciences well enough to critique it let alone develop your own methodology but please provide specifics on how exactly you go about determining the authenticity of a hadith and why you have chosen those methods.