Hadith collections / Al-Kafi

Al-Kafi · Hadith 5

The Book on Oneness of Allah (God) · Declaration, Definition and the Need for Solid Proof · Volume 1, book 3, chapter 32, Hadith 5

Original Arabic text

وَبِهَذَا الاسْنَادِ عَنْ يُونُسَ عَنْ حَمَّادٍ عَنْ عَبْدِ الاعْلَى قَالَ قُلْتُ لابِي عَبْدِ الله (عَلَيْهِ السَّلام) أَصْلَحَكَ الله هَلْ جُعِلَ فِي النَّاسِ أَدَاةٌ يَنَالُونَ بِهَا الْمَعْرِفَةَ قَالَ فَقَالَ لا قُلْتُ فَهَلْ كُلِّفُوا الْمَعْرِفَةَ قَالَ لا عَلَى الله الْبَيَانُ لا يُكَلِّفُ الله نَفْساً إِلا وُسْعَها وَلا يُكَلِّفُ الله نَفْساً إِلا ما آتاها قَالَ وَسَأَلْتُهُ عَنْ قَوْلِهِ وَما كانَ الله لِيُضِلَّ قَوْماً بَعْدَ إِذْ هَداهُمْ حَتَّى يُبَيِّنَ لَهُمْ ما يَتَّقُونَ قَالَ حَتَّى يُعَرِّفَهُمْ مَا يُرْضِيهِ وَمَا يُسْخِطُهُ.

Published English translation

Through the chain of narrators of the previous Hadith from Yunus has narrated from Hammad from ‘Abd al-A‘la who has said the following: “Once I said to (Imam) abu ‘Abd Allah (a.s.), ’May Allah keep you well, Has Allah placed a means in people to know?’ He replied, ‘No, He has not done so.’ I asked, ‘Will He hold them responsible for knowing?’ He said, ‘No, because it is for Allah to explain.’ ‘Allah does not impose on any soul a responsibility beyond its ability . . .’ (2:286) ‘Allah does not impose on any soul that which he cannot afford . . .’ (65:7) “I asked the Imam about the words of Allah in, ‘Allah does not misguide a nation after having given them guidance until the means of piety are made known to them . . .’ (9:115) The Imam said, ‘It (means of piety) means not until He gives the knowledge of what pleases Him and what displeases Him.’”

Narrator and transmission

See the transmission information preserved in the original source text.

Attributed scholarly assessments

Allamah Baqir al-Majlisi: مجهول

Mirʾāt al-ʿUqūl fī Sharḥ Akhbār Āl al-Rasūl (2/226)

Assessment transcribed from the source's named scholar and reference. No new grading or consensus is asserted; differing entries remain separate.

Shaykh Baqir al-Behbudi: Catalogue non-inclusion note (not an authenticity grade)

Ṣaḥīḥ al-Kāfī

Source records non-inclusion in this scholar's selection; this is not itself a weak or authentic grade.

Source, rights, and attribution

dataset Name
Thaqalayn public library, via ThaqalaynAPI snapshot
source Url
https://thaqalayn.com/hadith/1/3/32/5
license
Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)
edition
Al-Kafi, volume 1, Thaqalayn digital edition / Muhammad Sarwar translation
imported At
2026-10-18T21:36:12.871Z
license Url
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
rights Statement Url
https://thaqalayn.com/terms
attribution
Source: Thaqalayn (Stichting Thaqalayn). Compiler: Shaykh Muḥammad b. Yaʿqūb al-Kulaynī. Translation: Muhammad Sarwar. Data transport: MohammedArab1/ThaqalaynAPI. No endorsement implied.
translator
Muhammad Sarwar
source Revision
becbad600b693ce23735d7403c4126ce7c896d34
content Hash
ecd26728669f42b3f849ec5f8fe08a816469b373f64e197b30f17610e09b8d82
source File Hash
30bc491c96eb3860f3d3dfe97f46353a88858d7cb9e06d662ebdd04252ac5a3e
original Source Url
https://thaqalayn.net/hadith/1/3/32/5
changes
Arabic and English texts preserved verbatim from pinned snapshot. Compiler introduction excluded where present; references mapped to fields; assessment whitespace trimmed; source-supplied English sanad retained separately. Search normalization is not applied to displayed text.
verification Note
Publisher content rights, translator attribution and structural checks, with independent publisher-page spot checks—not scholarly authentication or printed-edition collation. Historical text and scholarly reference strings may contain source errors; they are not silently corrected. No full commentary prose or inferred narrator identity is added. Muʿjam coverage, where present, is only the supplied excerpt, not the complete work.