Not all chains are the same: Not all chains are the same. Scholars look at whether the chain is complete or broken.
A connected chain: A connected chain (Muttasil) is one where every person really met the next person and heard the words from him. There is no gap.
A broken chain has a gap: A broken chain has a gap. Sometimes a narrator says, "I heard from the Imam (as)," but he never actually met the Imam — he was born after the Imam passed away, or he lived too far away. That gap makes the Hadith weak, because we do not know who is missing.
Mursal, a special kind: There is also a special kind called Mursal: a later narrator quotes the Imam (as) directly, without naming the people in between. Scholars treat it with great care.
Example
A relay race: Think of a relay race. In a connected chain, each runner hands the baton to the next runner, hand to hand.
A missing runner: In a broken chain, one runner is missing. The baton seems to jump across an empty space. Did someone carry it? We do not know — so we cannot trust that part of the race.
Key Terms
- Muttasil (متصل) — a connected chain, with no gap
- Mursal (مرسل) — a Hadith where a later narrator quotes the Imam (as) directly, without naming the people in between
- Munqati' (منقطع) — a broken chain, with a gap
Quran or Hadith
None used in this topic.
Fresh diagram to be drawn: Two chains side by side: a connected chain with every link joined, and a broken chain with one link missing and a red question mark over the gap.
- A connected chain (Muttasil) has no gap — every person met the next.
- A broken chain (Munqati') has a gap, and the Hadith becomes weak.
- A Mursal Hadith skips the middle names, so scholars treat it with great care.