However, the scholars may differ with regard to certain reports: is its chain of transmission conclusive or not, and is the meaning it conveys definitive or merely apparent? This is like their disagreement over a solitary report that the ummah has accepted and affirmed, or one on which they have all agreed to act.

According to the vast majority of jurists and most theologians, such a report yields certain knowledge, while some theologians maintain that it does not.

Likewise, a report handed down through several independent lines, each corroborating the other, by specific narrators can provide indubitable knowledge to someone acquainted with those lines, with the condition of the transmitters, and with the surrounding clues and supporting factors—even though the same degree of knowledge may not be attained by one who lacks that background.

For this reason, the foremost hadith specialists—those deeply versed in the discipline—may reach complete certainty regarding some reports, whereas other scholars might not even presume their authenticity, let alone possess sure knowledge of it.

This is because a report can convey knowledge at times through the sheer number of informants, at other times through the qualities of those informants, or again through the very nature of the report itself, through the informant’s direct perception of the matter, or through the subject being reported.