Question:
Assalam alayekum Syyedi Sheikh Hisham!
I read a book written by Dr. Tahir ul Qadri in which he mentioned that among the signs of appearance of Syedna Imam Muhammad al Mahdi Alaye hi Salam is the solar eclipse on 1st of Ramadhan in that year and 2 lunar eclipses in Ramadhan in the year of appearance of Syedna Imam Al Mahdi Alaye hi salam.
Are there any such authentic narrations?
Shukran ya syyedi.
Answer:
`Alaykum as-Salam,
There is no such hadith but only a very unreliable saying attributed to Muhammad al Baqir the son of `Ali Zayn al-`Abidin, i.e. Muhammad b. `Ali b. al-Husayn b. Abi Talib (Allah be well-pleased with all of them) that the sign is a lunar eclipse on the 1st night of Ramadan and a solar eclipse in the middle of the same Ramadan (as happened in 2004). This
saying is narrated by al-Daraqutni in his Sunan (Azim Abadi ed. 2:65 §10 = Arna’ut ed. 2:419-420 §1795) through the arch-liar and arch-forger `Amr b. Shimr al-Ju`fi who apparently forged it, and claimed that he heard it from Jabir b. Yazid al-Ju`fi, whom the majority discarded and whom many considered a liar, from Muhammad al-Baqir, and
Allah knows best.
Hajj Gibril Haddad
