He also said—according to an authentic hadith:

“The guidance and knowledge with which Allah has sent me are like abundant rain that falls upon the earth. A portion of the land is good: it soaks up the water and produces plentiful herbage and pasture. Another portion retains the water, so Allah enables people to benefit from it—they cultivate and irrigate. A third portion consists of barren plains that neither hold the water nor grow any vegetation. Such is the example of the one who gains understanding of Allah’s religion and is benefited by the guidance and knowledge with which Allah has sent me, and the example of the one who shows no concern for it and does not accept the guidance of Allah with which I was sent.”

Thus the Prophet—may Allah bless him and grant him peace—invoked blessing for anyone who would transmit his hadith, even if that person did not themselves master its juridical implications, saying:

“It may be that a carrier of jurisprudential knowledge is not himself a jurist, and it may be that he conveys that knowledge to someone who is more learned than he is.”

When Allah sent Muhammad—may Allah bless him and grant him peace—those truly proficient in the Arabic language were found only in the Arabian Peninsula and its adjoining regions, such as the Hijaz, Yemen, and parts of al-Shām and Iraq. The language then spread until the majority of the inhabitants of the central lands spoke Arabic; even the Jews and Christians living in those regions spoke it just as most Muslims do—indeed