it therefore follows that the legal ruling attached to one’s theoretical knowledge of a given convention is not the same as the ruling that applies once that knowledge has actually been acquired. The latter ruling is contingent upon a lawful or rational warrant. Had he felt compelled to insert some didactic, Sharʿī framework into this composition, a brief treatment commensurate with real need would have sufficed; for anyone who consults a fiqh manual on these questions will not find it packed with the full array of legal issues he has crowded into this book. What truly merited such exhaustive detail was an explanation of how to carry out the procedures of horsemanship, and even then the work would still have been perfectly complete (1). In every science, the touchstone of sound authorship is mastery of that science, and confining oneself to it in writing is far more appropriate. Allah, exalted is He, is the One who grants success.
- He also writes (p. 394):
“I say: The verdict here was left to abstract inquiry, and we kept telling Your Excellency that this lies within the remit of the muftī who is asked for the legal ruling on the question as a matter of knowledge. We kept insisting that what best suits the purpose for which the book was composed is to speak about practical, military knowledge. We have already set aside whatever does not concern the horseman whose ultimate aim is to master the craft. As for the divergences in rulings that arise from those sciences (2), their proper place is with the jurist who specializes in them. We have pointed out that the topic you chose for the book is horsemanship, and none of those rulings bears on it in any meaningful way.
“In short, you have inserted nearly one hundred chapters that have no connection whatsoever to…”