How can we know the authentic Ahaadeeth narrated concerning the signs of the Hour?

All perfect praise be to Allaah, the Lord of the worlds. I testify that there is none worthy of worship except Allaah, and that Muhammad, sallallaahu ‘alayhi wa sallam, is His Slave and Messenger.

There are many Ahaadeeth that were narrated about the signs of the Hour. Some of them were narrated by Al-Bukhari and Muslim and they do not require much investigation because the Muslim Ummah unanimously agreed on their authenticity. However, there are other Ahaadeeth narrated in other than these two books. Such Ahaadeeth are not entirely authentic; rather, they include authentic, weak and even fabricated Hadeeths.

Therefore, there are two methods to recognize the weak ones:

1- Checking their chains of narrators; this task is only for the knowledgeable and experienced scholars in this field.

2- Checking the sayings of scholars, their verification of the Ahaadeeth and judgments either for or against them.

Scholars have been very interested in writing distinct books on the signs of the Hour, but they did not limit themselves to only include authentic Ahaadeeth. Instead, they listed many narrations without clarifying the degree of authenticity or weakness of the Hadeeth.

Allaah Knows best.