Al-Kafi · Hadith 3

The Book of Belief and Disbelief · The Messenger of Allah, recipient of divine supreme covenant, Was the First to Respond to the Call of Allah, the Majestic, the Glorious, and Testify That He Is the Lord · Volume 2, book 1, chapter 4, Hadith 3

Original Arabic text

3ـ مُحَمَّدُ بْنُ يَحْيَى عَنْ مُحَمَّدِ بْنِ الْحُسَيْنِ عَنْ عَلِيِّ بْنِ إِسْمَاعِيلَ عَنْ مُحَمَّدِ بْنِ إِسْمَاعِيلَ عَنْ سَعْدَانَ بْنِ مُسْلِمٍ عَنْ صَالِحِ بْنِ سَهْلٍ عَنْ أَبِي عَبْدِ الله (عَلَيهِ السَّلام) قَالَ سُئِلَ رَسُولُ الله (صَلَّى اللهُ عَلَيْهِ وآلِه) بِأَيِّ شَيْ‏ءٍ سَبَقْتَ وُلْدَ آدَمَ قَالَ إِنِّي أَوَّلُ مَنْ أَقَرَّ بِرَبِّي إِنَّ الله أَخَذَ مِيثَاقَ النَّبِيِّينَ وَأَشْهَدَهُمْ عَلَى أَنْفُسِهِمْ أَ لَسْتُ بِرَبِّكُمْ قَالُوا بَلَى فَكُنْتُ أَوَّلَ مَنْ أَجَابَ.

Published English translation

3. Muhammad ibn Yahya has narrated from Muhammad ibn al-Husayn from Ali ibn ‘Isma’il from Muhammad ibn ‘Isma’il from Sa’dan ibn Muslim from Salih ibn Sahl from abu ‘Abd Allah (a.s) who has said the following: “The messenger of Allah was asked, ‘By what means have you surpassed other descendents of Adam?’ He said, ‘I was the first one to affirm my faith in my Lord. Allah established a covenant with the prophets and made them to bear testimony against their own souls when the Lord asked, “Am I not your Lord.” They all said, “Yes, You are the Lord.” I was the first one to answer that question positively.’”

Narrator and transmission

See the transmission information preserved in the original source text.

Attributed scholarly assessments

Allamah Baqir al-Majlisi: ضعيف

Mirʾāt al-ʿUqūl fī Sharḥ Akhbār Āl al-Rasūl (7/36)

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/2/1/4/3
license: Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)
edition: Al-Kafi, volume 2, 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: 60df93b196ec317ca27076ebb8d3e2a4956672cd9f0dd1c4a54113a4f065fc8f
source File Hash: d538c07d5f74e5fbc26b065897c076eab247d4d7c09e633fbb6184de9f37ee78
original Source Url: https://thaqalayn.net/hadith/1/1/4/3
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. Snapshot URL's erroneous volume 1 segment corrected to volume 2 using the reviewed file/book/volume metadata and publisher chapter structure; original URL retained for audit.
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.