that are recommended and their rewards, and the reprehensibility of certain deeds and their punishment, then, regarding the amounts and kinds of reward and punishment, if a hadith is narrated which we do not know to be fabricated, it is permissible to narrate it and act upon it. This means that a person hopes for that reward or fears that punishment. It is like someone who knows that trade brings profit, but then hears that it brings great profit: if this report is true, it benefits him; if false, it does him no harm.

Examples include encouragement and warning through reports from the Children of Israel, dreams, sayings of the early generations and scholars, incidents in the lives of scholars, and similar material. None of these can, by itself, establish a ruling of Islamic law, whether that something is recommended or otherwise. They may, however, be mentioned for encouragement and warning, to inspire hope and instill fear. Where something is already known to be good or bad through scriptural evidence, such material benefits and does no harm, whether it is actually true or false. But anything known to be false and fabricated must not be given any consideration, for lies are of no benefit.

If a report is established as authentic, legal rulings are established on its basis. If it could be either true or false, it may be narrated because it could be true and because its being false causes no harm. Ahmad merely said:

“When reports concern encouragement and warning, we are more lenient with their chains of transmission.”

This means that we narrate such reports with their chains of transmission even when their narrators are not among the trustworthy narrators whose reports are accepted as evidence.

The same applies to the statement of those who say, “They may be acted upon concerning the virtues of deeds.” Acting upon them means only putting into practice what they contain of