How to Reconcile Between the Meanings of These Two Hadiths

Question :

How can we reconcile between the meanings of these two Hadiths:
"Islam began strange"

And:
"There will continue to remain a group from my Nation who will he victorious, upon the truth."

Answer:

There is no contradiction between the two. The meaning of the first Hadith is obvious and is easily understood because it corresponds to what we can clearly see. The completion of the first Hadith is :
"and it shall return strange, as it had begun, so good news to the strangers."

There is an addition to it in another narration:
"They will bring to life that which people have made to die from my Sunnah."

And in yet another narration :
"They are the ones who will make good that which people have spoiled."

The second Hadith indicates to us that goodness, knowledge, and furtherance of the truth will remain; that there shall remain a group who will remain victorious upon the truth. The meaning of "strangeness" is not at odds with the existence of this group, and this group does not necessarily have to be in one place.

The truth must remain until Dajjal appears and until the Wind comes. So this "strangeness" may increase in one area, while decreasing in another. It may even have many meanings that innovation is widespread, that most people look down upon congregational prayer, that good is not called too, that evil is not prohibited, and the greatest of all, that the people of Tawhid may be few in number while the people of Shirk will be widespread, and we ask Allâh Almighty to keep us safe from all evil.

Nonetheless, the Islam may be more dominant from one generation to the next, due to specific circumstances. As for the Hadith:
"There will not come a time except that what comes after it is worse than it".

We should understand from it that for the most part, every era is worse than the one that came before it. But there may be exceptions, times when one specific era is better than the one that preceded it, as happened during the era of 'Umar bin 'Abdul-'Aziz, for his time was better than the one that preceded when Sulaiman and Al-Walid ruled. Another example is the era of Shaykh Al-Islam Ibn Taymiyyah and his pupil, Ibn Al- Qayyim, for in their time, the Sunnah dominated while innovations were refutted. And yet another example is the state of the Arabian Peninsula after the advent of Shaykh Muham- mad bin 'Abdul-Wahhab, may Allah have mercy upon him.