As for those issues in which some contemporaries dissent under the pretext of ijtihād (independent reasoning) and a refusal to practice taqlīd (imitation), this is a confusion; for renouncing taqlīd does not entitle one to discard the ijmāʿ (consensus) of the Companions and the righteous predecessors, nor even to break away from the very opinions over which they themselves differed. If the Companions disagreed on a matter and it resulted in two views, the correct position is that it is impermissible to introduce a third, for departing from the statements of the Companions is bidʿah (innovation) and ḍalālah (misguidance), as the Imam of the Sunnah, Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal (may Allah have mercy on him), and other leading scholars have affirmed.

With respect to my work on this book, I collated the printed version with its sole manuscript and also compared it with the text preserved in Ibn al-Qaṭṭān’s al-Iqnāʿ, recording the variants among the copies in the footnotes. In those notes I have likewise indicated the beginning of every folio of the manuscript by placing the folio number in parentheses, thus: (1/A), (1/B), (2/A), and so forth. I traced every ḥadith and report that appears in the main text, added commentary where clarification was needed, and, whenever I found a useful point in other works on ijmāʿ or in the larger compendia, I inserted it to enrich the present volume.

Finally, this is the effort of one who falls short. I ask Allah for acceptance and for forgiveness of shortcomings. There is no power and no strength except through Allah.

Written by
Khālid b. Muḥammad b. ʿUthmān

18 Jumādā al-Ūlā 1425 AH