of the matters he needs, a thorn will remain lodged in his heart." ⦗1⦘

– Ibn al-Qayyim, may Allah have mercy on him, said: "The innovation of qadar (denial of predestination) surfaced toward the end of the Companions’ era; those of them who were still alive—such as ʿAbd Allāh ibn ʿUmar and Ibn ʿAbbās—rejected it. After the Companions had passed away, the innovation of irjāʾ (postponing judgment) appeared, and the senior Successors who encountered it spoke out against it. When the era of the Successors had ended, the Jahmite innovation emerged; it swelled in strength and its evil spread during the time of the leading imams, like Imām Aḥmad and his peers. After that came the innovation of ḥulūl (incarnationism), whose affair became manifest in the days of al-Ḥusayn al-Hallāj. Whenever Satan brings forth one of these or any other innovations, Allah raises up from among His party and His soldiers those who refute it and warn the Muslims about it—out of sincerity toward Allah, His Book, His Messenger, and the people of Islam." ⦗2⦘

– Ibn Ḥajar, may Allah have mercy on him, said in his commentary on al-Bukhārī: "Among the new developments were: first, the recording of hadith; then Qur’anic exegesis; then the compilation of legal questions generated purely through personal opinion; and finally the writing of works on the actions of the heart.

As for the first, ʿUmar, Abū Mūsā, and a group disapproved of it, while the majority permitted it.

As for the second, a number of the Successors—such as al-Shaʿbī—rejected it.

As for the third, Imām Aḥmad and a small group disapproved of it, and Aḥmad’s denunciation of the next category was even more severe.

Another development was the writing on the fundamentals of creed. Both the affirmers and the deniers engaged in it: the first group went to excess and fell into anthropomorphism, while the second went to excess and fell into negation. The early scholars—such as Abū Ḥanīfah, Abū Yūsuf, and al-Shāfiʿī—strongly condemned this, and their statements censuring the people of speculative theology are well known."