COMPILATION DURING THE 

COMPANIONS' ERA 
After the death of the Holy Prophet [PBUH] interest in Hadith literature increased greatly on
two accounts Firstly the companions who knew the Hadith at first hand were gradually
passing away Their number continued to diminish day by day. Therefore People became
keener to preserve the precious Hadith literature that had been stored in their memories
.Secondly the number of reverts was increasing rapidly and they showed great eagerness to
learn the Ahadith of the Prophet (PBUH]. The senior Companions became institutions of
teaching the traditions of the Holy Prophet (PBUH) Abu Hurairah narrated 5374 Ahadith
Abdullah bin Umar narrated 2630. Anas bin Malik narrated 2286 Ahadith while Ayesha
narrated 2210 Ahadith.
The companions were heard eagerly as they spoke about the sayings and actions of the
Holy Prophet(S.A). This was the age of the Rightly-Guided Caliphs(R.A). In this era, the
Companions had settled in almost all the countries conquered by the Muslims. Thus the
Ahadith were being circulated beyond the borders of Arabia. People flocked to the
Companions to hear the traditions of the Holy Prophets from them. Thus a number of
centers for the learning of Hadith came into existence, with these companions as the
teachers. When a person had learned all the traditions he The could from one companion,
he would go to the next companion and so on, collecting as many traditions as possible. The
zeal of these learners was so great that they undertook long journeys to collect Ahadith from
different Companions. It was reported that Jabir bin Abdullah(R.A) travelled from Makkah to
Syria to hear just one Hadith.
In this period although the Ahadith were being constantly memorized, and repeatedly
reported by the companion, the recording of these narration was not encouraged, lest the
Companions confused the Hadith with the Quranic text. Abu Hurairah(R.A) who transmitted
the largest number of Hadith, did not write them down, himself, However, he chose 138
Hadith dealing with Akchlag (Ethics and Morality) from the vast number of traditions he had
memorized, and dedicated them to his students. Hammam Ibn Murabbiah There were not
many regular compilations began on a large scale during the age of Tabi een who were the
followers of the Companions.