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PrincipleThe deen reaches us through continuous living practice
Cited in 20 segments across 16 recordings · 2018 to 2025 · principle/principle:living-tradition-as-source
Citing segments
Newest first. Each opens the whole segment, not a bare quote.
18 Oct 2025MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
How do Muslims know how to pray if the Quran does not spell it out?
Mufti Abu Layth says Muslims know how to pray from an unbroken living tradition of more than 1,400 years, father to child, documented in the books of every century; the guest asks why God describes prayer in the Quran if it must be learned at the mosque, and why two prayers are silent when 17:110 forbids silence.
machine4 min 51 s1:27:01on YouTube
18 Oct 2025MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Why are two of the daily prayers recited silently when 17:110 says not to be silent?
The silent prayers come from the living tradition Malik described, handed down from the Companions' descendants; Mufti Abu Layth reads 17:110 as being about crying out to Allah, neither in despair nor in silence, rather than the five prayers, citing 8:35 where 'prayer' means whistling and clapping.
machine10 min 12 s2:31:09on YouTube
19 Apr 2023video
LatestWhy does the practice of Madinah matter more than a single hadith?
Mufti Abu Layth says the inherited practice of Madinah, like its adhan, outweighs an isolated report, since not every Sunnah was documented and narrators made honest mistakes; this is why he favours the school of Madinah.
machine5 min 15 s6:49on YouTube
6 Feb 2023video
Is Engineer Muhammad Ali Mirza consistent in how he criticises hadith?
Not fully, says Mufti Abu Layth: Engineer Mirza's rational critique of others' hadith stops short of scrutinising how sahih hadith were authenticated. Mufti still calls him a legend and a much-needed voice.
machine8 min 28 s0:01on YouTube
25 Oct 2021video
Did Muslims learn how to pray from hadith books?
No: the practice of Islam reached us through the living tradition, taught from parent to child, not through hadith collections compiled two centuries later. Quranists are not one group, and many only doubt the accuracy of hadith.
machine2 min 37 s4:30on YouTube
25 Oct 2021video
Should I debate Quranists?
No: arguing never changes anyone's mind and only breeds hatred, so give your view if asked and see Quranists with compassion. He finds their case weaker than they think, since fiqh was built on the living tradition, not on hadith.
machine5 min 45 s7:07on YouTube
28 Aug 2020video
Does Edip Yuksel believe in praying five times a day?
Mufti Abu Layth thinks Edip Yuksel accepts the five prayers but not as the primary objective. Mufti calls rejecting all hadith the opposite extreme to hadith dogmatism, since all we know of early Islam comes through the living tradition.
machine8 min 13 s0:01on YouTube
4 Aug 2020Monday Nights with Mufti Abu Layth
Why did Imam Malik prefer the practice of Medina over hadith chains?
Mufti Abu Layth says the chain was once subordinate to the living tradition of Medina; al-Shafii's isnad project replaced regional trust with loyalty to the chain.
machine10 min 15 s2:04:25on YouTube
26 Jun 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Can hadith be sifted with criteria, or must the whole corpus be rejected?
Mufti Abu Layth says the Prophet's practice survives as a living tradition in fiqh and that he accepts a hadith only if it passes reason, the texts and the principles. The guest replies that narrators who fabricated a stoning verse forfeit all credibility, like a false witness in the Quran.
machine3 min 53 s48:57on YouTube
19 Jun 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Did the Prophet leave a written Quran, and what did the caliphs really do?
At the Prophet's death the Quran lived in the community's recitation, teaching and notes; he deliberately left no official codex. The caliphs merely spread copies, and the guest says the Bukhari narratives about their compilation are weak in chain and content.
machine3 min 57 s21:00on YouTube
22 Apr 2020MindTrap with Mufti Abu Layth
Can Sahih al-Bukhari be proven to be the book Imam al-Bukhari wrote?
Mufti Abu Layth holds that what is really mutawatir is the living tradition, not any hadith, and that Sahih al-Bukhari cannot be proven to be Bukhari's exact book since it rests on one unvouched transmitter, Farabri. Each report should therefore be weighed against reason, the Quran and the principles of Islam like any other hadith.
machine3 min 59 s1:01:06on YouTube
28 Sep 2019Ponderings on the Holy Quran
If some hadith are unreliable, doesn't that make the Quran unreliable too?
No: the Quran was passed on en masse as a recited living tradition, so doubts about particular hadith chains do not carry over to it.
machine7 min 37 s1:58on YouTube
28 Sep 2019Ponderings on the Holy Quran
Why the Quran could not be corrupted like hadith, and the fashion for chains
Corrupting the Quran was next to impossible because it was recited en masse everywhere; hadith, written down a century later, were easy to fabricate, and chains for the Quran came later as a fashion.
machine10 min 59 s12:47on YouTube
24 Jul 2019Ponderings on the Holy Quran
Does the Quran say there are three or five daily prayers?
The Quran does not spell out the number of prayers, but Sunnis, Shia and Ibadis all hold there are five, which Mufti Abu Layth takes as proof of an early living tradition that preceded the hadith books. The Shia combine the five rather than reducing them to three.
machine3 min 21 s0:01on YouTube
1 Mar 2019Ponderings on the Holy Quran
Does the Sana'a manuscript show that the Quran was changed?
The Sana'a manuscript and others such as the Birmingham manuscript date to the first century of Islam, when the Quran was the one text Muslims documented and taught everywhere. The Quran was too widespread and too distinctive in style to corrupt profitably, which is why fabrication targeted hadith instead.
machine5 min 15 s7:47on YouTube
1 Mar 2019Ponderings on the Holy Quran
Does the Sana'a manuscript support or undermine the Muslim account of the Quran's history?
The Sana'a find confirms the traditional account: a first-century Quran, companions who sometimes erred as the hadith say, and Uthman's standardisation of one reading. The largest discrepancy is a dropped word that exists elsewhere in the Quran.
machine4 min 08 s32:35on YouTube
20 Oct 2018Responding to Refutations
Is hadith the same as the sunnah, and is hadith certain knowledge?
The sunnah is distinct from hadith and reaches Muslims through the living tradition of fiqh, not from hadith books. Hadith are khabar ahad, not certain knowledge, so the Ash'ari and Maturidi orthodoxy does not build beliefs on them, and the Hanafis and Malikis reject solitary reports that contradict reason or their principles.
machine6 min 35 s1:13:18on YouTube
1 Sep 2018BukhariGate: Issues with Sahih al-Bukhari
What is BukhariGate and why does Mufti Abu Layth say Sahih al-Bukhari is not reliable?
Sahih al-Bukhari cannot reliably be traced to its author because it reaches us through one transmitter, al-Farabri, whom nobody vouched for in his lifetime, and because transmission and memory reconstruct what they pass on. Mufti Abu Layth accepts hadith by the scholars' own standards, that a report not contradict reason, the Quran or an Islamic principle, while relying on the living tradition that Imam Malik called the Sunnah.
machine5 min 10 s0:00on YouTube
30 Aug 2018BukhariGate: Issues with Sahih al-Bukhari
Summing up: judge Bukhari like any other book; the deen comes through living practice
Bukhari should be read like any other hadith book, each report judged on its merits against reason, the Quran and established principles. The religion itself reaches Muslims through the living tradition of practice, not through this book.
machine7 min 53 s1:32:44on YouTube
3 Aug 2018Responding to Refutations
How should Muslims decide which hadith to accept and which to reject?
Follow Imam Malik: accept some hadith and reject others. A report is accepted if it does not clash with reason, the Quran, the transmitted and corroborated Sunnah such as the practice of Madinah, or a principle of Islam; otherwise it is treated with caution.
machine3 min 26 s15:35on YouTube