The Hadith of Laylat al-Juhani (radi allah eanh): Its chains of narration and wording

Abstract

Laylat al-Qadr is a blessed night, and scholarly opinions regarding its exact determination have been numerous, reaching-according to Ibn Ḥajar-more than forty views. Among the well-known opinions is that it falls on the twenty-third night, an opinion supported by what is known as the “Ḥadīth of Laylat al-Juhanī.” This study aims to examine this ḥadīth through a critical ḥadīth-based analysis, focusing on identifying the Companion narrator, collecting its chains of transmission and textual variants, and determining which narrations are authentic and which are not. The study adopts the inductive method in collecting the narrations, the analytical method in examining them, and the inferential method in weighing and issuing judgments. The research is divided into two main sections: the first addresses the biography of ʿAbd Allāh ibn Unays (may Allah be pleased with him) and includes four subsections; the second examines the narrations of the Ḥadīth of Laylat al-Juhanī and consists of seven subsections. The study concludes by precisely identifying the personality of al-Juhanī, the narrator of the ḥadīth, verifying his attribution as Juhanī by alliance rather than lineage, and establishing that the ḥadīth has been transmitted with multiple wordings-some of which are authentic or sound due to corroborating chains, while others are deemed anomalous. It further concludes that reliance on this ḥadīth is generally acceptable, provided that its authentic wordings are carefully observed.