And if it is based on an interpretive misunderstanding—as with the Kharijites—they are not judged to be disbelievers, despite deeming the blood and property of Muslims lawful and seeking thereby to draw near to Allah Most High. This has preceded in the discussion of those who wage war against society, …
“Whoever neglectfully abandons any of the five acts of worship: if he resolves never to perform it, then, if he knows it to be obligatory, he must be asked to repent, as is an apostate; and if he is ignorant, he is to be informed. If he persists, he is executed as a prescribed legal punishment, without being judged a disbeliever—except in the case of prayer, if he is called to it and refuses; or if he repudiates a prerequisite or an essential element upon which there is consensus. In that case, he is executed for disbelief. This has preceded in the Book of Prayer.”
Of the five pillars of Islam, there is that whose abandonment constitutes disbelief by consensus, such as the testimony that there is no god worthy of worship but Allah and that Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah. Thus, if a person does not make this testimony, he is a disbeliever by the consensus of the Muslims. As for the remaining pillars, there is disagreement regarding them. One report from Ahmad states that a person disbelieves by neglectfully abandoning any one of them, whether prayer, zakah, fasting, or Hajj, because they are all pillars, and a thing is not complete without its pillars. The sounder view, however, is that he disbelieves only by abandoning the prayer, even if he does so out of negligence and laziness.
The author’s stipulation that the imam must summon him to prayer, or that he must be summoned to it, is the view adopted by the later jurists, may Allah have mercy on them. Yet there is nothing in the Book of Allah or the sunnah that indicates this. Rather, he is like anyone else who is asked to repent: if he repents, then so be it; otherwise, he is executed as a disbeliever. It is not a condition that the imam summon him. If it should happen that he dies before being asked to repent, then, as between him and Allah, he is a disbeliever doomed to remain eternally in the Fire. As for us, however, we do not judge him to be a disbeliever until he has been asked to repent and persists in abandoning the prayer.
He said: “Whoever is interceded with concerning a man and says, ‘Were the Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him, to come and intercede for him, I would not accept his intercession’—if he repents after he has been apprehended, he is to be executed, but not if he repents before that—because his statement:”