and speech, and through proof and exposition—to have me compile [for him] the scattered doctrinal views of the master of the people of religion, the imam of those who uphold the truth, who champions the truth and its adherents, expounds Allah’s proofs, and defends Allah’s religion through the knowledge Allah, glorified is He, granted him of the landmarks of His true religion and His straight path. He is the sword unsheathed against the people of desires and innovation, enabled to follow the truth and supported in championing guidance and right judgment. Through him, Allah, glorified and exalted is He, graciously opened the way for the people of the Sunnah and the community, enabling him to provide an exposition [of] the methods for elucidating the proofs of those who uphold the truth in support of their rightful position; and they sought his aid.

Through what He guided him to set down in his books and develop anew in his writings, Allah enabled them to uncover the path by which one comes to know the methods of detailed exposition and is guided to the grounds of proof: arguments that repel the insinuations of the innovators and the delusions of the misguided from the path of truth and the manifest religion. His exposition thus became a light and a sword for the people of the Sunnah, and a source of loss and vexation for the people of innovation. Great was Allah’s favour upon the people of the Sunnah and truth through his presence among them, and immense were His blessings upon them in clothing them in his distinctiveness.

He is ‘Abū Muhammad ʿAbd Allāh ibn Saʿīd al-Qattān’—may Allah be pleased with him and reward him for the immense blessings He bestowed upon him and, through him, upon them, with renewed bounty following His initial bounty. Indeed, He is Near and Responsive. This compilation likewise follows what I have gathered of the scattered doctrinal views of our shaykh, ‘Abū al-Hasan ʿAlī ibn Ismāʿīl