the exegesis of the early generations stands in direct opposition to theirs, that their interpretation is a later, blameworthy innovation, and that by following the detailed methods Allah has laid down to manifest the truth one can expose the unsoundness of their exegesis.

The very same problem appears among later authors who wrote commentaries on hadith: they treat those reports exactly as they treated the Qur’an, producing explanations that depart from the way of the early Muslims.

As for those who err in the proof but not in the intended meaning, they include many Sufis, preachers, jurists, and others who attach to the Qur’an meanings that are in themselves sound, yet the Qur’an does not actually indicate them—much like the material Abu ʿAbd al-Rahman al-Sulami records in Haqaʾiq al-Tafsir. Should any of those cited meanings be unsound, the mistake then falls into the first category: an error both in the evidence and in the meaning, for in that case the very sense they intend is itself corrupt.