[littlePen]

inshaAllah someone answer my previous question..coz i have a hard time believing in the coming of Imam Mahdi..since Imam Malik and others didnt even mention it?? such an important thing and they didnt even mention it?

Shaykh Gibril Haddad states "The hadiths about the Mahdi are so numerous that many of the Ulema consider the topic to be mutawatir in meaning, i.e. mass-transmitted and not possibly invented."

I also found this hadith regarding the Mahdi - The Prophet said: "The Hour shall not rise until a man from the People of my House [again the concept of royal family] shall rule by kingdom (yamluk), named after me, his father named after mine, and fill the earth with justice and equity just as it had been filled with oppression and injustice." Narrated from Ibn Mas`ud by Abu Dawud in his Sunan (book of al-Mahdi), al-Tabarani in al-Mu`jam al-Kabir (10:165 #10219), al-Hakim in al-Mustadrak (4:442) where al-Dhahabi said it is sound (sahih).

According to Shaykh Gibril Haddad "Belief in the Mahdi is Obligatory in Islam. It should be remembered also, that belief in al-Mahdi's coming and in his God-sanctioned reformative functions is an obligatory tenet of belief in Islam. The opening lines of Shaykh al-Islam, Ibn Hajar al-Haytami's book on the Mahdi entitled Al-Qawl al-Mukhtasar fi `Alamat al-Mahdi al-Muntazar ("The Brief Discourse on the Portents of the Awaited Mahdi") are:

It has been related that the Prophet said: "Whoever denies belief in the Dajjal, has certainly committed disbelief (man kadhdhaba bi al-dajjali fa qad kafara), and whoever denies belief in the Mahdi, has certainly committed disbelief (wa man kadhdhaba bi al-mahdi fa qad kafara)."
Abu Bakr al-Askafi narrated it in Fawa'id al-akhbar, and also [the hadith master] Abu al-Qasim al-Suhayli in his book Sharh al-Sira. End of Haytami's words.

The hadith mentioned above is also narrated by the hadith master Ibn Nasir al-Din al-Dimashqi in his book `Uqud al-durar fi `ulum al-athar (The pearl necklaces in the science of tradition) p. 156 and the hadith master Jalal al-Din al-Suyuti in his monograph al- `Arf al-wardi fi akhbar al-mahdi (The roselike fragrance in the reports of al-Mahdi) in his collected fatwas entitled al-Hawi li al-fatawi 2:161.

Under note #18 Dr.Suhaib Hasan in his book "An Introduction to the Science of Hadis wrote:"Although the Mahdi is not mentioned explicitly in the collections of al-Bukhari and Muslim, numerous sahih ahadith which are mutawatir in meaning speak of the coming of the Mahdi, a man named Muhammad bin 'Abdullah and a descendant of the Prophet through Fatimah who will be the Leader (Imam ,Khalifah) of the Muslims , rule for seven years and fill the world with justice and equity after it had been filled with tyranny and oppression.He will also fight along with Jesus son of Mary.The author, in his" The Concept of the Mahdi among the Ahlul Sunnah" has named 37 scholars who collected ahadith about the Mahdi with their own isnads and 69 later scholars who wropte in support of the concept compared to 8 scholars who rejected the idea.(page 62 of An Introduction to the Science of Hadith published by Darusalam,Riyadh , Saudi Arabia)

The author he means seems to be `Abd al-`Alim `Abd al-`Azim who wrote a Master's thesis titled al-Ahadeeth al-Waaridah fi al-Mahdi fi Meezan al-Jarh wa al-Ta'deel in which he states that there are thirty two authentic (hasan or sahih) Hadiths about Mahdi. Of these, nine of them mention the Mahdi explicitly while the others simply give a description of him. This quantification, of course, is unreliable as the man is obviously not a hadith master and is using a computer to reach his conclusion. However, he and Hasan can be cited insofar as they confirm what actual hadith masters and the Ulema of Ahl al-Sunna have long since established."

Also See this http://www.livingislam.org/comahdi_e.html

and Almighty Allah knows best