The rulings on emancipation contracts, on mutual imprecation between spouses, and on the stoning of the married adulterer have all but vanished from discussion. The purpose now is merely to display clever subtleties, dive after peculiar oddities, and refute those who came before. One man sets out to rebut Abū Ḥanīfah, another to rebut Mālik, a third to rebut al-Shāfiʿī—adorning his words with rhetorical gilt and ingenious stratagems—as though he did not realize that if, by this sophistry, he overturns a view that is correct in Allah’s sight, he will shoulder the sins of everyone who acts on that view for ages upon ages.

Here is someone condemning a predecessor for relying on opinion while he himself relies on it, and another accusing someone of innovation in Allah’s religion while he himself innovates.

In earlier days, disputants would weigh patience against gratitude, debate which of the two was superior, and discuss inner whispers, sudden thoughts, the struggle against the soul, and the curbing of passion. Today, however, they wrangle over “capacity,” “causal generation,” “the atomic leap,” the indivisible part, accident, and substance—ever toiling, groping about in the dark, their paths hopelessly entangled while caprice leads them by the bridle to ruin.