The Quran is not the only textual authority in Islam. There also exist the hadith, a collection Muhammad’s sayings. Here I present to you two of these that contradict one another. That is, do evil omens exist?

Thankfully, the Center for Muslim-Jewish Engagement at the University of South Carolina has provided for us the translated hadith.

First, in this linked hadith, Muhammad is credited with saying no, evil omens do not exist. (Also of interest is his denial of the germ theory).

But then we look at this linked hadith and see that evil omens indeed exist (I mean, it is hadith number 666, by the way). This hadith was wedged in with several ahadith* about diseased cows. To be honest I’m not quite sure how this one fits in with sick bovines.

While we should not trust the authenticity of the hadith (they were collected in a most haphazard way, sometimes hundreds of years after Muhammad died), they do paint a funny picture of Allah’s prophet. He appears to get his lies mixed up.

*”ahadith” is the plural of hadith.