He also said, “Follow and do not innovate, for you have been sufficed; every innovation is misguidance.”

He said as well, “Ambiguous matters will arise, so proceed with composure; to be a follower in goodness is better than to be a leader in evil.”

He further stated, “Today you remain upon the original sound nature. Soon you will innovate and innovation will confront you; when you encounter an innovated matter, hold fast to the earliest guidance.”

And he said, “Cling to the path. If you stay upon it, you will have forged far ahead; but if you veer to the right or to the left, you will stray far off course.” ⦗1⦘

The caliph ʿUmar ibn ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz—may Allah have mercy upon him—wrote to one of his governors: “I enjoin you to fear Allah, to show moderation in His affair, to follow the Sunnah of His Messenger ﷺ, and to abandon whatever the innovators introduced after him—matters for which his Sunnah had already set a precedent and spared us the burden. Know that no one invents an innovation without first producing some proof for it and presenting it as a lesson; therefore, you must