then I do not know which band it is.” Abū Bakr al-Khallāl said: “It is the band of Ahmad ibn Hanbal, may Allah be pleased with him: those who defend the Sunnah against the people of dissent, revive and make manifest the Sunnahs that people have allowed to die out, restore the practice of shunning the people of deviation and disputation, and adhere to the way of the foremost imam of his time, Ahmad ibn Hanbal, may Allah be pleased with him.”

As for Abū Hāmid, his learning in the divine sciences came from the speculative theologians, philosophers, and Sufis whose writings he understood. He had