The Qur’an and the Sunnah of the Prophet Muhammad(SAW) cannot be separated if Islam is to be understood in its complete and authentic form. The Qur’an is the revealed Word of Allah and the primary source of Islamic guidance, while the Sunnah represents the authoritative Prophetic explanation, interpretation and practical implementation of that revelation. Hadith literature, in turn, preserves reports about the sayings, actions, approvals and characteristics of the Prophet(SAW) through which much of the Sunnah has been transmitted and known. The contemporary claim that “the Qur’an alone is sufficient” and that Hadith is merely a collection of historical or biographical reports fundamentally misunderstands the Qur’anic conception of Prophethood. The central question, therefore, is not whether Muslims should choose between the Qur’an and Hadith. Rather, the question is how the Qur’an and the Prophetic Sunnah function together as the sources through which the religion revealed by Allah is understood, interpreted and practised.
The Qur’an occupies the highest and foundational position in Islam. It is the direct revelation of Allah, preserved in its exact wording and recited as an act of worship. Yet the Qur’an does not present itself as an isolated book whose commands are to be interpreted independently of the Messenger who conveyed it. Allah says: “We have revealed to you the Reminder so that you may explain to people what has been revealed to them” (Qur’an 16:44). This verse is particularly significant because it establishes an explanatory function for the Prophet(SAW). The Messenger was not merely commanded to transmit the words of the Qur’an; he was also entrusted with explaining their meaning and demonstrating their application. The Qur’an therefore provides principles and detailed guidance, but not every command is presented in the same manner or at the same level of detail. Some rulings are explicit and detailed, while others are stated as general principles whose practical application is demonstrated by the Prophet(SAW). The relationship may therefore be understood by analogy with a constitution and its authoritative implementation.
The Qur’an establishes fundamental principles, beliefs, moral values, legal commands and objectives, while the Sunnah provides an authoritative Prophetic explanation and practical model. Consider the Qur’anic command: “Establish prayer” (Qur’an 2:43; 4:103; 24:56). The command is absolutely clear. But where in the Qur’an are all the details of the five daily prayers specified? The Qur’an does not give, in one place, the complete number of rak‘ahs for every prayer, the detailed sequence of standing, bowing and prostration, the wording of the tashahhud, or all the rules concerning prayer. The Prophet(SAW) supplied this practical explanation when he said: “Pray as you have seen me praying” (Sahih al-Bukhari, Hadith 631). Likewise, the Qur’an commands Muslims to perform Hajj, but the detailed rituals of Hajj were demonstrated by the Prophet(SAW). He instructed his Companions: “Take your rites from me” (Sahih Muslim, Hadith 1297). The same principle applies to zakat. The Qur’an commands Muslims to give zakat, but numerous details concerning rates, thresholds, categories of wealth and practical administration are established through the Sunnah. Thus, the question “Why do we need Hadith if we have the Qur’an?” can be answered very simply: because the Qur’an itself directs believers to follow and obey the Messenger(SAW), and because the Messenger was appointed to explain and embody the revelation.
The strongest evidence for the authority of the Sunnah comes from the Qur’an itself. Allah says: “Whoever obeys the Messenger has truly obeyed Allah” (Qur’an 4:80). This verse does not say that obeying the Messenger is necessary only when he repeats a verse of the Qur’an. It establishes obedience to the Messenger as an independent religious obligation. Allah further says: “O you who believe! Obey Allah and obey the Messenger…” (Qur’an 4:59). Even more explicitly, Allah says: “Whatever the Messenger gives you, take it; and whatever he forbids you, refrain from it” (Qur’an 59:7). The wording is comprehensive. The believer is not instructed to accept only those Prophetic commands whose exact wording already appears in the Qur’an. The Messenger’s authoritative commands and prohibitions are binding upon believers because Allah has given him that authority. The Qur’an also states: “But no, by your Lord! They will not truly believe until they make you, O Prophet, judge in all disputes between them, and then find no resistance within themselves against your decision and submit wholeheartedly” (Qur’an 4:65). The Qur’anic standard of faith therefore includes acceptance of the Prophet’s judgment. This leads directly to the question of whether the Sunnah can establish a ruling that is not explicitly mentioned in the Qur’an. This requires an important distinction. The Sunnah does not introduce a religion independent of the Qur’an, nor can an authentic Prophetic ruling contradict the Qur’an. Rather, the Sunnah may explain a Qur’anic command, specify something stated generally in the Qur’an, restrict an otherwise general Qur’anic wording, clarify an ambiguity, or establish a practical rule through Prophetic authority where the Qur’an has not provided an explicit ruling.
Classical Islamic jurisprudence recognizes the Sunnah as an authoritative source of law alongside the Qur’an, while maintaining the Qur’an’s primacy as the foundational revelation. For example, the Qur’an prohibits marrying two sisters simultaneously: “And that you marry two sisters together…” (Qur’an 4:23). The Prophet(SAW) also prohibited combining a woman with her paternal aunt or maternal aunt in marriage. This ruling is recorded in authentic Hadith, including Sahih al-Bukhari and Sahih Muslim. Similarly, the Qur’an explicitly mentions certain categories of prohibited food, while the Prophet(SAW) prohibited additional categories through authentic Sunnah, including domesticated donkeys and predatory animals with fangs. These rulings were accepted by classical Muslim jurists as legally authoritative. This demonstrates that the function of the Sunnah is not restricted to repeating Qur’anic wording.
The Prophet(SAW) was an authoritative teacher, judge and interpreter of divine guidance. Another argument sometimes advanced against the authority of Hadith is based on Allah’s statement: “Today I have perfected your religion for you, completed My favour upon you, and chosen Islam as your way” (Qur’an 5:3). There is no contradiction between the perfection of Islam and the authority of the Sunnah. The perfection of religion means that Allah completed and perfected the revealed guidance given through His Messenger(SAW). It does not mean that every individual ruling must appear as an explicit sentence in the Qur’an. The Qur’an itself establishes the institution of Prophethood and commands obedience to the Messenger. Therefore, the religion is complete precisely through the complete revelation and Prophetic guidance that Allah ordained. The Sunnah is not an unauthorized addition to Islam; it is an integral component of the Prophetic mission established by the Qur’an. The Qur’anic portrayal of the Prophet (SAW) is much richer than that of a messenger who simply delivered a text. Allah says: “He recites to them His revelations, purifies them, and teaches them the Book and wisdom…” (Qur’an 2:129; 2:151; 3:164; 62:2). The expression “the Book and wisdom” has been understood by many classical scholars as including Prophetic Sunnah.
The Prophet(SAW) therefore performed several functions: he conveyed revelation, explained it, taught it, judged disputes, trained the Companions, implemented its principles and provided a living model of Islamic life. Allah says: “Indeed, in the Messenger of Allah you have an excellent example for whoever has hope in Allah and the Last Day and remembers Allah often” (Qur’an 33:21). An “excellent example” cannot be reduced to a written text. It necessarily involves the Prophet’s actual conduct. It is also important to distinguish between Sunnah and Hadith. The Sunnah refers broadly to the normative way, practice, teachings and example of the Prophet(SAW). Hadith refers to the reports through which his sayings, actions, approvals and descriptions have been transmitted. In simple terms, Sunnah is the Prophetic model, while Hadith is one of the principal means by which that model is transmitted and preserved. Not every report attributed to the Prophet(SAW) is automatically authentic.
“The Qur’an is the supreme foundational criterion of Islam, while the Sunnah—preserved through authentic Hadith—is its authoritative, practical embodiment; true faith requires adhering to both together.”
Islamic scholarship developed sophisticated sciences of Hadith criticism precisely to distinguish authentic reports from weak and fabricated ones. Scholars examined chains of transmission, narrators, continuity, textual content and other criteria. Therefore, the correct position is neither to accept everything attributed to the Prophet nor to reject Hadith altogether. The correct position is to distinguish authentic from weak reports through the established principles of Hadith scholarship. Those who claim that only the Qur’an is authoritative face a fundamental difficulty: the Qur’an itself commands obedience to the Messenger. If someone says, “I accept only the Qur’an,” we may reasonably ask what the Qur’an means by “obey the Messenger.” If the answer is that the Messenger is obeyed only when he recites Qur’anic verses, then the separate Qur’anic commands to obey the Messenger, accept his judgment and follow his example lose much of their practical meaning.
The Qur’an does not tell Muslims merely to read the revelation. It tells them to follow the Messenger. Prayer provides the clearest practical demonstration. Muslims throughout the world perform the five daily prayers according to a Prophetic form transmitted through the generations. The basic structure of Muslim worship cannot be reconstructed from the Qur’an alone. The same is true of Hajj, zakat and many aspects of marriage, inheritance, commerce and personal conduct. Thus, the “Qur’an alone” approach does not merely remove some historical reports. It removes the authoritative Prophetic explanation through which Muslims have actually understood and practised the Qur’an. Another objection is that the Qur’an is preserved, whereas Hadith was transmitted by human narrators. There is an important truth here: the Qur’an and Hadith do not have exactly the same epistemological status. The Qur’an is transmitted as divine revelation and is universally accepted as the literal Word of Allah. Individual Hadith reports vary in strength, and therefore scholars classify them as sahih, hasan, da‘if and so forth. But this distinction does not justify rejecting Hadith altogether.
The Muslim scholarly tradition developed an extraordinary system for preserving Prophetic reports. Companions transmitted what they heard and witnessed; later generations travelled extensively to collect reports; scholars examined chains of transmission and biographies of narrators; and major Hadith collections were compiled and critically assessed. The existence of some weak or fabricated reports does not prove that all Hadith are unreliable. On the contrary, the ability to identify fabricated reports demonstrates the sophistication of the Hadith sciences. If the Qur’an is interpreted without the Sunnah, two opposite dangers arise. First, a person may interpret general Qur’anic statements according to personal opinion without regard to the Prophet’s explanation. Second, a person may selectively accept those Qur’anic principles that fit his own understanding while ignoring the Qur’an’s commands concerning obedience to the Messenger.
The Sunnah protects the practical meaning of revelation. It shows how the Prophet(SAW) understood the Qur’an, how he applied it and how he taught his Companions to live by it. For this reason, the development of Islamic jurisprudence, the work of the great Imams and the immense Hadith scholarship of later generations all reflect the same fundamental principle: Qur’an and Sunnah must be approached as interconnected sources of Islamic guidance.
The relationship between Qur’an and Sunnah should therefore not be described as a competition between two independent books. The Qur’an is the primary revelation. The Sunnah is the authoritative Prophetic guidance established within the framework of that revelation. Hadith is the principal textual means through which much of the Sunnah is transmitted. The Prophet(SAW) is reported to have said: “I have left among you two things; you will never go astray so long as you hold fast to them: the Book of Allah and the Sunnah of His Prophet.” The precise chains and wordings of this report are discussed by Hadith scholars, but its underlying principle is entirely consistent with the Qur’anic commands to obey and follow the Messenger. At the same time, one should avoid an inaccurate formulation that every statement uttered by the Prophet(SAW) in every conceivable circumstance automatically has the same legal status as a Qur’anic verse.
The scholars distinguish between revelation, legislation, personal matters, customary practices and other aspects of Prophetic conduct. They also distinguish between obligatory, recommended, permissible and context-specific practices. Likewise, a Hadith cannot be treated as authentic merely because it appears in a book or is commonly quoted. Its authenticity and legal significance must be evaluated according to the principles of Hadith and Islamic jurisprudence. Therefore, affirming the authority of Sunnah does not mean abandoning critical scholarship. Rather, it means applying the rigorous scholarly methods developed by the Muslim tradition to determine what constitutes authentic and legally authoritative Prophetic guidance. The relationship between the Qur’an, Sunnah and Hadith is therefore fundamental to the correct understanding of Islam. The Qur’an is the ultimate revealed foundation of Islam, while the Sunnah is the authoritative Prophetic explanation and practical embodiment of that revelation. Hadith literature preserves a substantial body of evidence through which the Sunnah is known and transmitted. The Qur’an itself commands Muslims to obey the Messenger (SAW), accept his judgments, follow his example and take what he gives them. Allah says: “Whoever obeys the Messenger has truly obeyed Allah” (Qur’an 4:80), and: “Whatever the Messenger gives you, take it; and whatever he forbids you, refrain from it” (Qur’an 59:7). These verses make it impossible to construct an authentic Islamic worldview in which the Qur’an is accepted but the authoritative Sunnah of the Prophet(SAW) is rejected.The Sunnah does not represent a competing revelation or an alternative religion. Rather, it is the Prophetic guidance through which the Qur’anic message was explained, embodied and implemented.
Where the Qur’an gives a general command, the Sunnah frequently provides its practical details. Where the Qur’an is explicit, the Sunnah reinforces and clarifies it. Where the Prophet(SAW) gives an authentic ruling under his divinely sanctioned authority, Muslims are required to accept it, provided that the report establishing it is authentically transmitted and properly understood. The example of prayer alone makes the matter unmistakable. The Qur’an commands prayer, but the Prophet(SAW) taught Muslims how to pray. The Qur’an commands Hajj, but the Prophet(SAW) demonstrated its rites. The Qur’an commands zakat, while the Sunnah provides numerous details necessary for its implementation. Consequently, the question should not be framed as “Qur’an or Hadith?” The authentic Islamic question is: “How do we understand the Qur’an according to the guidance of the Messenger(SAW) who was appointed by Allah to convey, explain and exemplify it?” To separate the Qur’an from the Sunnah is therefore to separate revelation from its divinely appointed Prophetic explanation. The Qur’an gives the believer the message; the Messenger(SAW) shows the believer how that message is to be lived. The most balanced formula is therefore that the Qur’an is the foundation, the Sunnah is its authoritative Prophetic explanation and practical embodiment, and authentic Hadith is one of the principal means through which that Sunnah has been preserved and transmitted. A complete understanding of Islam requires all three to be approached together, with the Qur’an as the supreme revealed criterion and the authentic Sunnah as the authoritative Prophetic guide to understanding and implementing it. To accept the Qur’an genuinely is consequently to accept the Messenger(SAW) whose obedience the Qur’an itself has made an essential part of faith.
(The author a veteran academician is a former Professor and Head Department of Islamic Studies, Kashmir University. The views, opinions and conclusions expressed in this article are those of the author and aren’t necessarily in accord with the views of “Kashmir Horizon”)
