What matters here is that a report may be known to be true, known to be false, or its status may remain unknown.

Certainty that a report is true has two possible meanings:

1. We may know that the content itself corresponds to reality regardless of who conveyed it—like someone informing us of matters we already recognise as facts even without his statement.

2. We may know that the one who conveys it is truthful in this particular narration.

Both meanings can coincide, so that we are sure of the content’s veracity and equally sure that the transmitter is speaking truthfully. The Prophet Muhammad’s declaration, “I am the Messenger of Allah,” belongs to this category, as we shall clarify, God willing.

Conversely, branding a report a “lie” can likewise carry two senses. It may mean simply that the content contradicts reality, even though the narrator had no intention to deceive. Or it may mean that the narrator knowingly fabricated the statement.

For this reason the hadiths whose falsehood is established fall into two types: sometimes it is evident that the transmitter deliberately lied, and sometimes he merely made a mistake. Among the Companions no one is known ever to have willfully lied about the Prophet—may Allah bless him and grant him peace—and the same holds for the great majority of the Successors. A small group within the Shiʿah, however, is known to have harboured individuals who intentionally fabricated reports, unlike others among