Still another imagined that whatever the custodians of the prophetic legacy (1)—the hadith transmitters and the bearers of glad tidings—had conveyed to him was nothing but false hopes and empty, fanciful tales (2).

One man was so completely overtaken by panic and dread that thoughts swept across his heart (3) like clouds racing through the sky (4); he had neither a mind able to grasp nor a tongue able to speak.

With yet another, the evidences clashed and his desires pulled in opposite directions (5). He could not distinguish, among the promised glad tidings, the truthful from the spurious; he drew no line, in hadith transmission, between the mistaken and the correct. He knew nothing of the transmitted texts with a scholar’s discernment—indeed he was either wholly ignorant of them or had picked them up with the superficial hearing of the common folk (6). Such a person seldom notices their subtle points of indication, nor does he find guidance (7) to rebut what he imagines—at first glance (8)—to be at odds with them.

For that reason bewilderment seized even those who had worn the badge of guidance, and conflicting opinions began pelting them like children hurling pebbles—

“There, the believers were tested and shaken with a violent shaking.” (Q 33:11)