like all others who err in appealing to transmitted evidence: their error lies either in the chain of transmission or in the text itself. These men, however, formulated their rules on the basis of their own reasoning, and they erred in judgment and reason.

The Christians are therefore closer than these men to honoring the prophets and messengers. Yet the Christians resemble those who introduce a religious innovation through a faulty understanding of the texts or by believing a falsely transmitted report from the Messenger, such as the Kharijites, the Wa'īdiyya, the Murji'a, the Imāmiyya, and others, in contrast to the innovation of