Isnad in the context of "Matn"

Early Islamic philosophy or classical Islamic philosophy is a period of intense philosophical development beginning in the 2nd century AH of the Islamic calendar (early 9th century CE) and lasting until the 6th century AH (late 12th century CE). The period is known as the Islamic Golden Age, and the achievements of this period had a crucial influence in the development of modern philosophy and science. For Renaissance Europe, "Muslim maritime, agricultural, and technological innovations, as well as much East Asian technology via the Muslim world, made their way to western Europe in one of the largest technology transfers in world history." This period starts with al-Kindi in the 9th century and ends with Averroes (Ibn Rushd) at the end of 12th century. The death of Averroes effectively marks the end of a particular discipline of Islamic philosophy usually called the Peripatetic Arabic School, and philosophical activity declined significantly in Western Islamic countries, namely in Islamic Spain and North Africa, though it persisted for much longer in the Eastern countries, in particular Persia and India where several schools of philosophy continued to flourish: Avicennism, Illuminationist philosophy, Mystical philosophy, and Transcendent theosophy.

Intellectual innovations, achievements, and advancements of this period included, within jurisprudence, the development of ijtihad, a method or methodological approach to legal reasoning, interpretation, and argument based on independent inquiry and analogical deduction; within science and the philosophy of science, the development of empirical research methods emphasizing controlled experimentation, observational evidence, and reproducibility, as well as early formulations of empiricist epistemologies; commentaries and developments in Aristotelian logic, as well as innovations in non-Aristotelian temporal modal logic and inductive logic; and developments in research practice and methodology, including, within medicine, the first documented peer review process and within jurisprudence and theology, a strict science of citation, the isnad or "backing".

Hadith is the Arabic word for a 'report' or an 'account [of an event]' and refers to the Islamic oral tradition of anecdotes containing the purported words, actions, and the silent approvals of the Islamic prophet Muhammad or his immediate circle (companions in Sunni Islam, Ahl al-Bayt in Shiite Islam).

Each hadith is associated with a chain of narrators (isnad), a lineage of people who reportedly heard and repeated the hadith from which the source of the hadith can be traced. The authentication of hadith became a significant discipline, focusing on the isnad (chain of narrators) and matn (main text of the report). This process aimed to address contradictions and questionable statements within certain narrations. Beginning one or two centuries after Muhammad's death, Islamic scholars, known as muhaddiths, compiled hadith into distinct collections that survive in the historical works of writers from the second and third centuries of the Muslim era (c. 700−1000 CE).

The Sahabah (Arabic: اَلصَّحَابَةُ, romanized: aṣ-ṣaḥāba, lit. 'the companions'), also known as the Companions of Muhammad, were the Muslim disciples and followers of the Islamic prophet Muhammad who saw or met him during his lifetime. The companions played a major role in Muslim battles, society, hadith narration, and governance during and after the life of Muhammad. The era of the companions began following the death of Muhammad in 632 CE, and ended in 110 AH (728 CE) when the last companion Abu al-Tufayl died.

Later Islamic scholars accepted their testimony of the words and deeds of Muhammad, the occasions on which the Quran was revealed and other important matters in Islamic history and practice. The testimony of the companions, as it was passed down through trusted chains of narrators (asānīd), was the basis of the developing Islamic tradition. From the traditions (hadith) of the life of Muhammad and his companions are drawn the Muslim way of life (sunnah), the code of conduct (sharia) it requires, and Islamic jurisprudence (fiqh).

Musannaf hadīth collections are defined by their arrangement of content according to topic and constitute a major category within the class of all such works. Etymologically, musannaf is the passive particle of the Arabic verb sannafa, meaning to arrange by chapter, and so has the literal meaning of something that is sectionally arranged. Though the designation can thus apply to any text so ordered, and indeed has been used with respect to such distinct genres as fiqh (i.e. Islamic jurisprudence), in practice it is most typically applied to compilations of ahadīth.

Numerous hadīth collections are of the musannaf variety, including the Six Books (i.e. the six canonical collections of hadith in Sunni Islam). A less typical format is the musnad compilation, where content is arranged according to the original transmitter of the report, typically a companion of Muhammad.