Logical Fallacies: Unmentioned Does not Mean Non-Existent
Book title: Indonesia Ulema Challenge Spurious Lineage: KH. Imaduddin Utsman al-Bantani's Refutation of the Book by Hanif Alatas et al
Title of Original / Indonesian version: Ulama Nusantara Menggugat Nasab Palsu: Jawaban KH. Imaduddin Utsman al-Bantani terhadap Buku Hanif Alatas dkk
Penulis/Author: KH. Imaduddin Utsman Al-Bantani, pengasuh pesantren Nahdlatul Ulum, Banten
Cetakan pertama/First Edition: November 2024
Publisher: Lakeisha 2024
15,6 cm X 23 cm, 691 Pages
ISBN : 978-623-119-469-5
Bidang studi: Sejarah Baalawi, sejarah Nabi, ilmu nasab, sejarah Islam, genealogi, garis keturunan, filologi/manuskrip, Tes DNA
Publisher of English version: Al-Khoirot Research and Publication
Fields of study: Ba'alawi history, history of the Prophet, science of lineage, Islamic history, genealogy, bloodline / lineage, philology/manuscripts, DNA testing
Table of Contents
- Logical Fallacies
- Unmentioned Means Non-Existent
- The Book Al-Syajarah Al-Mubarakah is a Mukhtasar (Abridged) Book
- The Nominal Sentence (Jumlah Ismiyyah) in Al-Syajarah Al-Mubarakah is Hashr (Restrictive)
- Efforts by Hanif et al. to Cast Doubt on the Book Al-Syajarah Al-Mubarakah
- Doubting Al-Syajarah Al-Mubarakah Because of Imam Mahdi
- Inaccuracy of the Restrictive (Hashr) Claim According to Hanif et al.
- The Answer of Mahdi al-Raja'i Used as Proof by Hanif et al.
- Back to Book Indonesian Scholar Proves The Falsity of The Ba 'Alawi Lineage Connecting to the Prophet Muhammad
LOGICAL FALLACIES
Unmentioned Means Non-Existent
Hanif et al. stated:
"1. The seven books cited by Imaduddin
indeed do not mention Ubaidillah/Abdullah as a son of Ahmad bin Isa. However,
what needs to be noted is that not a single one of those books negates
Abdullah as a son of Ahmad bin Isa. Not finding something does not mean it
does not exist, or similarly, unmentioned does not mean non-existent. It is
possible that he existed, but was simply not mentioned in that specific place
while being mentioned elsewhere. This is a very fundamental logic in
scientific study.
والقاعدة العلمية المشهورة تقول: عدم الوجدان لا يستلزم عدم الوجود أي عدم رؤيتك لشيء تفتش عنه لا يستلزم أن يكون بحد ذاته مفقودا أو غير موجود.
The famous scientific maxim states: 'Adam al-wijdan la yastalzimu 'adam al-wujud', meaning that your failure to see something you are searching for does not necessitate that the thing itself is missing or non-existent."From Hanif's statement above, the author provides the answer as to why not a single genealogy book used as the author's reference negates the name Ubaid/Ubaidillah/Abdullah as Ahmad's son. The answer is: how can he be negated when no one has ever mentioned his name in the first place? What can be negated is that which exists; if it does not exist, how can it be negated? For example, if in the fifth century the name Ubaid was brought forward as Ahmad's son by a genealogist (nassabah) and then another genealogist negated it, such an occurrence is possible and happens often. However, the name Ubaid never appeared at all in genealogy books from the 4th to the 9th centuries. It appeared for the very first time in the ninth century Hijriah through the claim of a Ba'alwi individual named Ali al-Sakran.
Hanif et al. applied the maxim incorrectly. The maxim they brought forward is meant for matters of creed (aqidah), namely for things whose existence has been known through revelation, such as the existence of jinn, which we must believe in. We cannot say that jinn do not exist simply because we cannot see them. Hanif's maxim was quoted from the book Fiqh al-Sirah al-Nabawiyyah by Muhammad Said Ramadan al-Buti. Please note the preceding sentence in that book:
ولا ينبغي أن يقع العاقل في أشد مظاهر الغفلة والجهل من حيث يزعم أنه لا يؤمن إلا
بما يتفق مع (العلم)، فيمضي يتبجح بأنه لا يعتقد بوجود الجان، من أجل أنه لم
ير الجان ولم يحس بهم . أن من البداهة بمكان أن مثل هذا الجهل المتعالم،
يستدعي إنكار كثير من الموجودات اليقينية لسبب واحد هو عدم إمكان
رؤيتها. والقاعدة العلمية المشهورة تقول : عدم الوجدان لا يستلزم عدم
الوجود؛ أي عدم رؤيتك لشيء تفتش عنه لا يستلزم أن يكون بحد ذاته مفقودا أو
غير موجود.
"A rational person should not fall into the most extreme forms of heedlessness and ignorance by claiming that he only believes in what conforms with 'science,' and then going on to boastfully declare that he does not believe in the existence of jinn simply because he has not seen them or felt them. It is absolutely self-evident that such pseudo-scholarly ignorance demands the denial of many indisputably certain realities for the sole reason that they cannot be seen. The famous scientific maxim states: non-finding does not necessitate non-existence ('adam al-wijdan la yastalzimu 'adam al-wujud); meaning that your failure to see something you are searching for does not necessitate that the thing itself is missing or non-existent."
So, that maxim speaks about jinn, which exist but are unseen. It does not
speak about Ubaid, who is unmentioned as a son of Ahmad.
Meanwhile,
Ubaid's lineage does not fit into that maxim because Ahmad bin Isa's name has
already been mentioned along with the fact that he had three sons: Muhammad,
Ali, and Husain. Hanif cannot argue that Ubaid not being mentioned as Ahmad's
son does not mean he is not Ahmad's son, because the other children have
already been explicitly mentioned.
Hanif stated:
"Likewise in the science of genealogy. Not mentioning means sukut (silence). Silence does not mean anything, neither isbat (affirming) nor nafi (negating). The explanation is as follows:This rule is inappropriate to use for the name of Ubaid, who was not mentioned as Ahmad's son. Why were the other children mentioned while Ubaid was not? The answer is because Ubaid was not Ahmad's son. If the phenomenon was, for example, that it was only mentioned that Ahmad bin Isa had children without specifying their names, that would be understandable. However, here, the names of all his children were already mentioned in the 6th century H, and there is no name of Ubaid/Ubaidillah/Abdullah there. Therefore, any subsequent claim regarding the existence of another son of Ahmad besides those three is rejected.
Silence regarding a lineage and not mentioning it is not considered an issue in the science of genealogy because the person who remains silent may potentially be ignorant, or took it from someone ignorant, or restricted themselves to what was mentioned. It is possible that the unmentioned lineage was mentioned in another book that has not reached us."
If Hanif says: perhaps in another book around the 5th and 6th centuries Hijriah someone mentioned Ubaid as Ahmad's son—then please bring the book if it exists. IT DOES NOT EXIST.
The correct maxim for the Ba'alwi lineage is:
يظهر صنع النسب من خلال الانتساب الى ابن مجهول واب معلوم
"The fabrication of a lineage is clearly visible from tracing ancestry to an unmentioned son of a mentioned father."A strong indication that the Ba'alwi lineage is fabricated is that they trace their ancestry to Ubaid, who is unmentioned in genealogy books, yet is claimed to be the son of Ahmad, who is mentioned in genealogy books.
The Book Al-Syajarah Al-Mubarakah is a Mukhtasar (Abridged) Book
Hanif et al. stated:
"For example, in this case, the author of the book Syajarah Mubarakah did not require ihathah (mentioning everything comprehensively). In fact, at the beginning of his book, he emphasizes that the book is only a mukhtashar (abridgement/summary). After the basmalah, he writes: (هذا مختصر في علم الأنساب) 'This is an abridgement in the science of genealogy' (al-Syajarah al-Mubarakah, p. 3)."The book Al-Syajarah al-Mubarakah begins with the phrase "Hadza Mukhtasarun fi 'ilmil ansab" (This is an abridgement in the science of genealogy). Because the book is a mukhtashar book, it is natural that the name Ubaid was not mentioned as Ahmad's son—this is likely what Hanif et al. meant. This indicates that Hanif et al. do not understand the meaning of "mukhtasar" in general and the meaning of "mukhtasar" in the science of genealogy specifically. A "mukhtasar" (abridgement) must not reduce the murad al-kalam (the intended meaning of the speech); it only reduces the tatwil al-kalam (the elongation of the speech).
As seen on the first page of Al-Syajarah al-Mubarakah, Imam Al-Fakhrurazi mentions, "The children of Sayyidina Ali who left descendants are five..." even though, in reality, Sayyidina Ali had many children—historians record up to 18 children. However, Imam Fakhrurazi only mentioned the five who left descendants. Why? Because Al-Syajarah al-Mubarakah is an abridged book. If it were an itnab book (an expansive/detailed book, not a mukhtasar), it would have first mentioned that Sayyidina Ali's children totaled 18, namely: Hasan, Husain, and so on, and only then stated: while the children who left descendants out of those 18 were only five, they are, etc.
If Imam Fakhrurazi knew that the children of Sayyidina Ali who left descendants numbered five, but he said three, then that would not be a mukhtasar, but an intentional lie. Another example: Imam Fakhrurazi knew, according to his knowledge, that the children of Ahmad bin Isa who left descendants were only three: Muhammad, Ali, and Husain, and so he stated as such. Therefore, it is not a mukhtasar, but rather his children were indeed only three.
It defies common logic that someone known to have four children would be said to have three just for the sake of shortening the sentence. If we see three ducks walking and waddling in front of us, and a friend next to us asks, "How many ducks are there?" and we reply, "There are two ducks." Why two when there are three? "I intended to make a mukhtasar (shorten the sentence)!" You cannot do that. The probability is that the person who said there are two ducks is either blind, cannot count, or is intentionally lying for a certain purpose.
When Imam Fakhrurazi mentions that the children who left descendants are three—Muhammad, Ali, and Husain—there are several conclusions we can understand from that narrative. First, the children of Ahmad bin Isa who had descendants up to Imam Fakhrurazi's time were only three; second, there were other children besides those three, but they did not leave descendants; third, there was another child who left descendants, for example Ubaidillah, but Imam Fakhrurazi intentionally lied for a certain motive. If hypothetically the third point occurred, then what was Imam Fakhrurazi's motive for not mentioning Ubaidillah? The Ba'alwi community must investigate what Imam Fakhrurazi's motive was for omitting Ubaidillah. Was it out of sentiment? Was there animosity? Or what?
Clearly, no such motives will be found. Imam Fakhrurazi lived in Rayy during the sixth and seventh centuries. He did not know Ubaidillah at all; nor did he ever know that at some point in the future, there would be people trying to attach themselves to the lineage of Ahmad bin Isa. He merely recorded, according to his knowledge, that the children of Ahmad bin Isa who left descendants were three: Muhammad, Ali, and Husain.
Hanif stated:
"In conclusion, Imaduddin's framework of thinking—which concludes that Ubaidillah is not the son of Ahmad bin Isa because seven books do not mention Ubaidillah as Ahmad bin Isa's son—is a form of logical fallacy. The correct framework of thinking is that Ubaidillah not being mentioned as a son of Ahmad bin Isa does not mean Ubaidillah is not a son of Ahmad bin Isa. In fact, there are other books confirming that Ubaidillah is the son of Ahmad bin Isa, so these books complement each other's information."Hanif says: even if he is not mentioned in the book Al-Syajarah, there are other books that mention Ubaid as Ahmad's son. Where is the genealogy book? None exists, except after the 9th century H. While it is acceptable if it is unmentioned in Al-Syajarah but mentioned in another book, the reality is that there is no genealogy book before the 9th century H. that mentions Ubaid as Ahmad's son. The first time the name Ubaid appeared as Ahmad's son was in a book belonging to the Ba'alwi; and the genealogy book that mentioned it for the first time was Tuhfat al-Thalib (996 H.), and even that was with the admission that it was mentioned without references from genealogy books, having only been obtained from a ta'liq (a small note).
The Nominal Sentence (Jumlah Ismiyyah) in Al-Syajarah Al-Mubarakah is Hashr (Restrictive)
Hanif et al. stated:
"Only mentioning three means negating the others, including denying Ubaidillah as a son of Ahmad bin Isa. Again, this kind of thinking by Imaduddin is a logical fallacy..."That is not a logical fallacy; rather, that is how genealogists establish the rules of genealogy science—that when a genealogist records the number of children using a jumlah ismiyyah (nominal sentence), it indicates that the children are limited strictly to the number mentioned. When Imam Al-Fakhrurazi mentioned that his children were three using the nominal sentence "Fa 'aqibuhu min tsalasati banin" (and his descendants are from three sons), then Ahmad's children were indeed only three: Muhammad, Ali, and Husain. There was no child named Ubaid.
Ibn Inabah (d. 828 H) in the book Umdat al-Talib al-Kubra stated:
ومن ذالك اذا قالوا عقبه من فلان او العقب من فلان فانه يدل على ان عقبه منحصر
فيه وقولهم اعقب من فلان فان عقبه ليس بمنحصر فيه الجواز ان يكون له عقب من
غيره
"Part of the terminology of genealogists is that when they say: [عقبه من فلان] ('aqibuhu min fulan: his offspring is from so-and-so, using a nominal sentence) or [العقب من فلان] (al-'aqbu min fulan: the offspring is from so-and-so, also using a nominal sentence), it indicates that his offspring is strictly restricted to the child mentioned. Conversely, the statement of a genealogist: [أعقب من فلان] (a'qaba min fulan: he left offspring from so-and-so, using a verbal sentence/jumlah fi'liyyah), indicates that his offspring is not restricted to the one mentioned, because it remains possible that he had offspring from another child."
Efforts by Hanif et al. to Cast Doubt on the Book Al-Syajarah Al-Mubarakah
In their book, Hanif et al. attempt to dismantle the robustness of the book Al-Syajarah al-Mubarakah as the work of a great scholar of Ahlussunnah Waljamaah, Imam al-Fakhrurazi—a genealogist who was also the author of the great exegesis titled Mafatih al-Ghaib. All these efforts will be in vain because it is clearly recorded in the manuscript that the book is genuinely the work of Imam al-Fakhrurazi. Note the last page of the book:
The manuscript of the book Al-Syajarah al-Mubarakah is located in
the Sultan Ahmad III Mosque Library in Istanbul under number 2677. This
manuscript was written by Wahid bin Syamsuddin in the year 825 H based on the
original manuscript signed by Imam Fakhruddin al-Razi, who completed writing
it in the year 597 H. The title and the attribution of this book are clearly
and neatly recorded at the end of the book: that this book is named
Al-Syajarah al-Mubarakah, the copy was validated by Muhammad bin Umar bin
Husain al-Razi (the author of the book), and then Imam Al-Razi wrote that he
had read this book in front of Ali bin Syaraf Syah bin Abil Ma'ali and granted
him an ijazah (authorization/license) for it.
Doubting Al-Syajarah Al-Mubarakah Because of Imam Mahdi
Hanif et al. stated:
"Al-Imam Fakhr al-Din al-Razi is known as a great Sunni Shafi'i scholar. Strangely, many things strongly indicate that the owner (author) of al-Syajarah al-Mubarakah was someone with a Shia ideology. Among them are the following: 1) On page 78 of the book al-Syajarah al-Mubarakah, when the author mentions the son of al-Imam Hasan al-Askari, it is written: [صاحب الزمان عجل الله فرجه الشريف ] (Sahib al-Zaman, may Allah hasten his noble return)."Imam Al-Fakhrurazi was indeed a Sunni scholar, but regarding the matter of Imam Mahdi, it appears his view inclined toward that of the Shia. Namely, considering that Imam Mahdi had already been born, then went into occultation (ghaib), and holds the title Sahib al-Zaman. In addition to Al-Syajarah al-Mubarakah, Imam Al-Fakhrurazi also referred to Imam Mahdi as Sahib al-Zaman in his book Al-Mathalib al-Aliyah below:
وجماعة من الشيعة الامامية يسمونه بالامام المعصوم وقد يسمونه بصاحب الزمان
ويقولون بأنه غائب ولقد صدقوا في الوصفين ايضا
"And a group of people from the Imami Shi'ah call him 'the Infallible Imam'. And sometimes they also call him 'Sahib al-Zaman' and they say that he is in occultation (ghaib). And they are correct in both descriptions as well..."Note the phrase "Walaqad shadaquu" (And they are truly correct). Thus, Imam al-Fakhrurazi's explicit agreement regarding Imam Mahdi as Sahib al-Zaman clearly reinforces that the book Al-Syajarah al-Mubarakah is genuinely the book of Imam al-Fakhrurazi, because in his other book, he validates the Shia group who call Imam Mahdi Sahib al-Zaman.
Inaccuracy of the Restrictive (Hashr) Claim According to Hanif et al.
Hanif et al. brought forward several examples to argue that hashr is sometimes
inconsistent. In reality, it is not inconsistent, but rather Hanif et al. do
not understand the method of genealogists. For example, Hanif said that in
Al-Syajarah al-Mubarakah, the children of Ali al-Uraidi who left descendants
are said to be three people, whereas in Tahdhib al-Ansab, it is said there are
four people.
The book Al-Syajarah al-Mubarakah in the 6th century
H. mentions that the children of Ali al-Uraidi who left descendants were three
because those with surviving lineages in the 6th century only amounted to
three children. Meanwhile, a century prior in Tahdhib al-Ansab, there were
four children who left descendants. Subsequently, one child's lineage became
extinct (inqirad) by the 6th century H., as reported by Al-Syajarah
al-Mubarakah.
Other examples presented by Hanif et al. concerning
allegations of inconsistency in the hashr of a nominal sentence (jumlah
ismiyyah) only arise because Hanif et al. do not comprehend the methods of
genealogists as the author mentioned above.
The Answer of Mahdi al-Raja'i Used as Proof by Hanif et al.
In order to defend their lineage, the Ba'alwi sent an envoy to Sheikh Mahdi al-Raja'i (the editor/muhaqqiq of the book Al-Syajarah al-Mubarakah) to obtain a validation (itsbat) for their lineage. Sheikh Mahdi al-Raja'i did indeed validate it, even in two ways: first with a signature, and second via video. However, that signature and video validation mean nothing because no proof (dalil) was presented by Sheikh Mahdi al-Raja'i. In the rules of genealogy science, such signatures hold no weight in validating a lineage. As Sheikh Khalil bin Ibrahim mentioned a rule:
لا عبرة بكثرة التواقع ان لم يكن النسب صحيحا فكثرة التواقيع لا تصحح خطأ
والتوقيع حجة على من وقع لا حجة على غيره
"There is no value in a large number of signatures if the lineage is not valid. A multitude of signatures does not correct an error. A signature is a proof (hujjah) against the one who signs it; it is not a proof against anyone else."
ENDNOTES
- Hanif dkk. . .h.227
- Hanif dkk. . .228
- Khalil bin Ibrahim . . .h. 65
- Hanif dkk. . .h. 229
- Hanif dkk. . .h.235
- Hanif dkk. . .h.236
- Ibnu Inabah . . .h.340
- Hanif dkk. . .h. 243
- Imam al-Fakhrurazi, Al-mathalib al-Aliyah, juz ke-8 h. 106
- Khalil bin Ibrahim . . .h.125