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Can someone explain if my understanding of a "strong" Hadith is correct?

I have heard Muslims say there are strong and weak Hadiths. I read that isnad is a "proper support" for a written Hadith. This means (I believe) that there is a chain of people from the person writing the Hadith back to someone who was a companion of Muhammad. Is this the proper definition of a "strong" Hadith and how is it proved that these people spoke to each other and kept the message "pure" (can't think of a better word)? Thank you for your help. Have a great day!

Public Comments

1. a strong hadith is a hadith that it's propability of it being true is very high.....i think it means that it was realy said by mohammad(pbuh) and it wasn't changed in any way...and there are proofs that support this...but i'am not very sure though
2. yeah all the information are right a weak hadith is a hadith that isnt told by sahih muslim or bukhari
3. A strong Hadith means that it is 100% correct or 100% people back then agreed. A weak Hadith can be 99% correct of 99% of the people agree and it would still be considered a weak Hadith.
4. All hadiths we have today are confirmed by a verse of the Quran to back up their meaning. Strong or weak is used to describe the personanility of the narrator and the strength of the chain. If a single person in the long chain of narration had been known to ever tell one lie in his life then every hadith he every narrated would be considered weak but we keep it if it was exactly narrated the same way by other good sources. Narration strength is used when having to choose between two hadiths for deciding on Islamic laws. These terms were used when making religious decisions by scholars so you dont have to do the deep homework. .
5. After some hundred years of death of Prophet Mohammed, people started recording hadith in written form..While writing they used to write the chain of narrator, they also mention if there is a proof that so and so person have met the other. They also mention about each person about their character and truthfulness, they also mention how strong were their memory, So, they consider all these factors before declaring these hadith as strong or weak or even some as fabricated.
6. Praise be to Allaah. A saheeh (which you call a strong) hadeeth is one which is narrated by men of good character, who are known for their good memories and precision, with a continuous isnaad, and is not odd or faulty. If the precision is lacking and is not complete, then it is hasan li dhaatihi (hasan in and of itself). If it has a number of isnaads, then it is saheeh li ghayrihi (saheeh because of corroborating evidence). See Nakhbat al-Fikr by al-Haafiz Ibn Hajar (may Allaah have mercy on him). From this definition we may sum up the conditions of a saheeh hadeeth as follows: 1 – Good character of all its narrators 2 – Good memory and precision on the part of narrators with regard to what they are narrating. 3 – Continuous isnaad from beginning to end, meaning that each narrator heard the hadeeth from the one before him. 4 – The hadeeth is free from any oddness in its isnaad or text. What is meant by “odd” is anything in which the narrator narrates something that contradicts the narration of a sounder narrator. 5 – The hadeeth is free from faults in its isnaad and text. A “fault” is a subtle problem that undermines the soundness of the hadeeth, which can be detected only by the well versed scholars of hadeeth.