they are the worst of those slain (1) beneath the canopy of heaven, while those they kill are the best of those slain.” (2)

These people first appeared during the caliphate of the Commander of the Believers ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib, may Allah be pleased with him. In outward acts of prayer, fasting, Quran-recitation, devotion, and asceticism they surpassed most of the Companions, yet they stood outside the Sunnah of the Messenger of Allah ﷺ and outside the community (3) of the Muslims. They murdered a Muslim named ʿAbd Allāh ibn Khabbāb and raided the Muslims’ livestock (4).

By contrast, the group we confronted performed even less prayer and fasting; in their mountain we did not find a single copy of the Quran, nor a single person who recited it. What they did possess were doctrines that flatly contradicted the Book and the Sunnah and by which they deemed Muslim blood licit. Through them rivers of blood have been shed and wealth has been seized in amounts known only to Allah Most High.

If ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib permitted his army to take whatever was in the Khārijī camp—after having killed them all—then these people are even more deserving of having their property taken.

Moreover, they are not like the misguided interpreters against whom ʿAlī called out on the Day of the Camel: “Do not kill anyone who turns his back, do not finish off a wounded man, do not seize their property (5), and do not take their children captive,” (6) for those earlier opponents had a colorable interpretation, whereas these have no justification whatsoever.