Jonathan A. C. Brown

"For much of Islamic history, the unit through which the Sunna was preserved, transmitted, and understood has been the hadith (Arabic plural, ahaadith ), or a report describing the words, actions, or habits of the Prophet Unlike the Quran, the hadiths were not quickly and concisely compiled during and immediately after Muhammad’s life Because hadiths were recorded and transmitted over a period of decades and even centuries, they are not in and of themselves contemporary historical documentation of what Muhammad said and did"

"No compulsion in religion’ (2:256) was a Quranic command revealed in Medina when a child from one of the Muslim families who had been educated in the towns Jewish schools decided to depart with the Jewish tribe being expelled from Medina. His distraught parents were told by God and the Prophet in this verse that they could not compel their son to stay. The verse, however, has been understood over the centuries as a general command that people cannot be forced to convert to Islam."