The Significance of the Historio-biography of the Narrators of the Hadith for the Shia

As the hadith are susceptible to distortion, perversion and alteration, Islamic scholars have been very much concerned about the authentication of the hadith to ensure that they can rightly be attributed to Imams. Hence, Muslims have developed the historio-biography of the transmitters of the haith, as a distinct discipline, in order to assess the credibility of their narrators. Most Muslim scholars argue that familiarity with the biographies of the narrators is a prerequisite for embarking on Islamic research and scholarship. On the other hand, a minority, that is, Akhbaryyūn, insist that all hadith collections, particularly the Shiite four books are authenticated. So, they believe that there is no need for paying attention to the biographies of the narrators. However, such a weak argument is untenable, and the discipline, beside other Islamic disciplines, has flourished, as it is attracting more and more attention.