the innovations. Yet many of our own worshippers have fallen into some of that, either on the basis of excusable misinterpretations or with no interpretation at all (1).

The report also points out that initiating severity with oneself becomes a cause for another severity that Allah will inflict—either through the Sacred Law or through His decree.

As for severity through the Law: it resembles what the Prophet—may Allah bless him and grant him peace—feared in his lifetime of additional obligations or prohibitions, such as his concern when the people gathered to perform the Tarāwīḥ prayer with him (2)(3), and when they would inquire about matters that had not been forbidden. Another instance is that whoever vows to perform an act of devotion becomes obliged to fulfill it, even though he is discouraged from making the vow in the first place; likewise are the expiations that become obligatory for specific reasons.

As for severity through divine decree: we have often seen and heard of people who carry excess rigor in certain matters and are then tried with circumstances that tighten affairs upon them in both obligations and prohibitions. Many of those beset by obsessive doubts regarding purification, for example, when they go beyond what the Law prescribes, are afflicted with real causes that impose upon them matters that are onerous and harmful (4)(5)(6)(7).