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Information other than Quran to Prophet Muhammad

Question: Was there any information given to Prophet Muhammad, other than the revelations recorded in the Quran?

Answer: Peace be upon you. The Quran informs us that the entire Quran was placed into prophet Muhammad’s soul on the 27th Night of Ramadan, after which he had to reveal it to the people over a period of 23 years in a specific sequence (97:1, 17:1, 44:3, 53:1-18, 17:106). Other than the content of the Quran (often referred to as ‘the revelation’), we learn that God did have other communication with the prophet as well, but which was not meant to be part of the Quran text.

For example, verses 66:3-5 tell us that God informed Prophet Muhammad about something his wives did, but we don’t know what exactly God told him. What is important and relevant for us is not what God specifically told the prophet, but the lessons we can get from the verses about how the prophet and his wives dealt with a certain issue. Several lessons can be learned, such as: nothing is hidden from God; we must trust/obey God’s messenger and never betray him or disregard his instructions; God always establishes the truth; God supports His servants; you must repent and reform from errors, etc.

[66:3] The prophet had trusted some of his wives with a certain statement, then one of them spread it, and GOD let him know about it. He then informed his wife of part of the issue, and disregarded part. She asked him, "Who informed you of this?" He said, "I was informed by the Omniscient, Most Cognizant."

So again, what is relevant for us to know for our salvation is what God has recorded in the Quran. The Quran is extremely efficiently designed where specific details are mentioned where required, or sometimes only a few words are adequate to fully address a subject (10:37, 18:109). Or God may explain it through the example of an incident like the one above.     
http://www.masjidtucson.org/quran/appendices/appendix18.html. Similarly, there would be times where God would have given the prophet instructions for dealing with the community or revealed certain knowledge but which was not to recorded as the Quran text.
 
Unfortunately, traditional Muslims sometimes take situations like this out of context and interpret them to mean that the information in the Hadith books is all the “other” information, conversations or instructions which God communicated to Prophet Muhammad. This is how they claim that the Hadith is needed to get all the instructions and explanations about Islam!

This is completely incorrect, of course. Prophet Muhammad did not decree the Hadith. He was not even allowed to explain the Quran, because God is the Teacher of the Quran (55:1-2, 75:16-17). The Hadith books are falsehood attributed to Prophet Muhammad about what he is supposed to have said or done.
Please see the following pages for more on this:
http://www.masjidtucson.org/quran/appendices/appendix12.html,   http://www.masjidtucson.org/quran/appendices/appendix19.html     

Peace be upon you and may God bless you