A Reference-Based Authentication of al-Kāfī

Penned by Muhammad Ya’qoub Kulainī, al-Kāfī holds an important position among the Shia hadīth collections due not only to its comprehensiveness, chapter design, and reliable references but also to his living in an era close to that of Shia imams (AS), high scientific status, and access to four hundred principles of Shia hadīth collection. The present study seeks to verify the authenticity of al-Kāfī through the examination of its references. For this purpose, historical evidences and the viewpoints held by Muslim scholars on its references were studied. They included the four hundred principles of Shia hadīth collection, earlier hadīth collections as well as those collections whose compilers have been disqualified, those collections whose compilers’ trustworthiness have been disputed, and those reliable collections whose compilers have been disqualified. The results suggested that Kulainī has tapped reliable resources to compile al-Kāfī as a highly trustworthy collection of hadīth.