Iʿtibār:1 literally, reflection and examination. Technically, the tracing of the routes of a ḥadīth in order to identify mutābaʿāt and shawāhid.
When a narrator transmits a ḥadīth and his solitary transmission is suspected, and that suspicion arises in the mind of the critic, then if another transmits the very same ḥadīth, this is mutābaʿa. If the second narrator transmits it from the same teacher, it is al-mutābaʿa al-tāmma (complete corroboration).
If he transmits it from the teacher's teacher, or from someone higher up, this may also be called mutābaʿa, but it falls short of the first form in proportion to how far removed it is. This is called al-mutābaʿa al-qāṣira (the deficient corroboration), and it may also be designated al-shāhid (the witness).
If the very same ḥadīth is not transmitted through any of the routes mentioned above, but another ḥadīth with the same meaning is transmitted, this is al-shāhid; it is not called mutābaʿa.
So al-mutābaʿa al-tāmma is called only mutābaʿa; al-shāhid is called only shāhid; and al-mutābaʿa al-qāṣira is sometimes called mutābaʿa and sometimes shāhid.2
The pursuit of mutābaʿa and shāhid is what is called al-iʿtibār.3
Iʿtibār: literally, reflection and examination. Technically, the tracing of the routes of a ḥadīth in order to identify mutābaʿāt and shawāhid. [tr.] ↩
This is the substance of what al-Biqāʿī, al-Sakhāwī and al-Zayn Zakariyyā al-Anṣārī understood from Ibn al-Ṣalāḥ's words in his Muqaddima (p. 65), as set out in al-Nukat al-Wafiyya, 1/479; Sharḥ al-Taqrīb by al-Sakhāwī, p. 145; and Fatḥ al-Bāqī, 1/245–246. The same is suggested by al-ʿIrāqī's words in al-Tabṣira, 1/204, and by al-Zarkashī's notes on Muqaddimat Ibn al-Ṣalāḥ, p. 207. Al-Nawawī, however, understood from Ibn al-Ṣalāḥ that mutābaʿa, whether tāmma or qāṣira, is termed shāhid; this too is possible, though the former is the more apt reading. ↩
Note that iʿtibār is needed only when doubt has arisen in the mind of the critic, as is understood from the words of Ibn Ḥibbān, Ibn al-Ṣalāḥ, al-Nawawī, al-ʿIrāqī, al-Sakhāwī, al-Suyūṭī, and others. Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal was once asked: "Who corroborates ʿAffān on such-and-such?" He replied: "Does ʿAffān need anyone to corroborate him?" See: Ṣaḥīḥ Ibn Ḥibbān, 1/155; Muqaddimat Ibn al-Ṣalāḥ, p. 65; Tadrīb al-Rāwī, 1/243; al-Tabṣira, 1/205; Sharḥ al-Taqrīb by al-Sakhāwī, p. 144; Fatḥ al-Mughīth, 2/257. ↩
If a narrator transmits from one of two persons who share the same name, without giving anything to distinguish him from the other, this is al-muhmal.
If the narrator is not named (a shaykh, a man, some of them, a thiqa), this is al-mubham; the unnamed narrator may be identified through another route, and the Mubhamāt literature is devoted to this.
A muʿallal ḥadīth contains a hidden defect (ʿilla) damaging to its soundness, detected by warning signs in sanad and matn that arise to one familiar with the art.
Al-shādhdh is that which a single narrator has transmitted alone, raising doubt in the mind of the critic; this is also the definition of al-munkar. Statements of the early imāms show the two are one.
