to them because they are the ones through whom it became manifest, whereas innovations are attributed to their imams because they are the sources from which those innovations arose.

For this reason, the broad principles of the creed that writers on religious doctrines attribute to the people of the Sunnah and the community are the views of Ahmad and other imams of the Sunnah like him.

[Al-Ash‘arī’s statement in al-Ibāna about following Imam Ahmad]

For this reason, Abū al-Hasan al-Ash‘arī said in his book al-Ibāna:

“If someone says, ‘You have rejected the views of the Jahmiyya, the Qadariyya, the Harūriyya, the Rāfida, and the Murji’a. Tell us, then, the position you uphold and the religion you profess,’ he is told:

‘The position we uphold and the religion we profess consist in adhering to the Book of our Lord, the Sunnah of our Prophet, and what has been transmitted from the Companions and their successors. We uphold what Abū ‘Abd Allāh Ahmad Ahmad ibn Hanbal upheld, and we shun whatever contradicts his position, for he is the virtuous imam and the consummate leader through whom