The guy in the picture above is Sheikh Yassir Qadhi, 50 yrs old, preeminently the doyen of Islamic scholars in the United States of America. Here is some bio:
- Yasir Qadhi (b. Jan 30, 1975) Pakistani American Muslim scholar, theologian.
- Studied chemical engineering at the University of Houston
- Masters in Hadith and Islamic theology, Islamic University of Madinah
- PhD from Yale University (dissertation on Ibn Taymiyyah)
- Chairman of the Fiqh Council of North America.
- Dean of The Islamic Seminary of America
- Formerly dean of AlMaghrib Institute
- Resident scholar at East Plano Islamic Center in Plano, Texas.
- Taught at religious studies department at Rhodes College
Recently Sheikh Yassir dropped a bombshell about the 'science' of hadith. In no time at all other people have made videos analysing Yassir Qadhi's statements. Here are two of them - both quite short.
In the first video here Yassir Qadhi says:
Nobody in the academy affirms the Muslim Sunni science of hadith. Nobody. It is considered to be completely discredited.
My preliminary conclusion is there is no middle ground. And historical critical method and isnad analysis are two diametrically opposed ways of looking at early Islam and reports and I dont find much commonality between them as of yet. Oviously in small areas here but overall two diametrically opposed epistemologies..
(epistemology - the theory of knowledge, the study of the limits of human knowledge)
Here is a screen grab (from the following video) of a written statement by Yassir Qadhi about what he meant.
Here is the other short video:
