The Hadith are authoritative and any sentient Moslem who actually reads about his own cult and its dogma, and who can struggle through the mountainous volumes of the Hadith; should be alarmed that Sharia Law is premised largely on these works coupled with the Koran. In fact, Moslem 'scholars', or cult propagandists as they should be named, believe that the Hadith are as divinely inspired as the Koran and are therefore legitimate as sources of 'law'.
Considering that the most authoritative Hadith was compiled by Bukhari more than 200 years after the totalitarian Muhammad's death, this must surely strike the rational observer as somewhat perplexing. Bukhari was simply a scribe, not a prophet, not a healer, not a man of spiritual faith, but a Moslem apologist who compiled some 7000 verses to try and explain the inexplicably bad Koran. There is no evidence that he or the Hadith are 'divinely inspired'.
In any event the Hadith give Islam a very bad name. A certain Moslem 'scholar', a Dr. Muhammad Hamidullah, in his book, 'Introduction to Islam', states that 'the custodian and repository of the original teachings of Islam' are found 'above all in the Quran and the Hadith' (p. 250). He adds that 'the Quran and the Hadith' are 'the basis of all [Islamic] law' (p. 163).
Another Moslem apologist and respected as a 'thinker' on Islam, one Dr. Muhammad Muhsin Khan wrote an encyclical entitled, 'The Translation of the Meaning of Sahih Al-Bukhari' and he confirms the following:
-The Quran and the Hadith are both based on divine inspiration' (p. 23).
-[Allah] revealed to him [Bukhari] the Glorious Quran and the Second Inspiration, i.e., his Traditions.
-It is incumbent upon you to strive hard to do righteous deeds according to the traditions of Muhammad as is clearly expressed in his Hadith (p. Xvii).
Khan believes that Moslems must obey the Koran and Hadith to the letter and 'strive' to spread Islam by any way possible. In this line of 'thought' the Koran and Hadith are portrayed as divinely written and this is confirmed in Bukhari, in Hadith no. 643, vol. 9.
However, the real history of the Koran reveals that there are many Korans, many pre-Muhammadan phrases and writings which are in the Koran; and that the Koran itself was written long after Muhammad's death in the Arabic dialect of the Quraish and that even today there are 4 known versions of the Koran. As a matter of record, Bukhari's Hadith confirm that the Koran was put together by the Caliph Uthman after Muhammad died. The fact that the Quran is missing certain verses and that other verses were abrogated is admitted in the Hadith in vol. 4, nos. 57, 62, 69, 299; vol. 6, nos. 510, 511.
There is a couple of points to be made about the Hadith. First is that they espouse Jihad and violence against Infidels. Second, they were written 200 years post the Jihad's founder's death and are hardly liable to be accurate or true. Third, they reinforce the fraudulent nature of the Koran, being written by humans, and are full of mistakes, and rather incoherent. Fourth, they do not contain a spiritual-ethical program which is universal or immanent. It is a dichotomous cult. Be nice to Moslems. Convert, kill or dominate the rest.