ijtihad, and they do so in ignorance.
158 – He said, “Can you show me any other proof, apart from what you have already mentioned, that gives scholars the right to speak on such matters?”
159 – I replied, “Yes.”
160 – He said, “Then mention it.”
161 – I said, “I know of no one who disputes that our predecessors—and the generations after them down to our own day—had their judges decide cases and their muftis issue fatwas on matters for which there was no explicit text from the Book or the Sunnah. That, God willing, is clear evidence that they ruled solely by ijtihad.”
162 – He said, “Can you cite something from the Sunnah to support this?”
163 – I said, “Indeed. Al-Rabiʿ narrated to us: al-Shafiʿi narrated to us: ʿAbd al-ʿAziz ibn Muhammad ibn Abi ʿUbayd al-Darawardi narrated to us, from Yazid ibn ʿAbd Allah ibn al-Had, from Muhammad ibn Ibrahim al-Taymi, from Busr ibn Saʿid, from Abu Qays, the client of ʿAmr ibn al-ʿAs, from ʿAmr ibn al-ʿAs, who heard the Messenger of Allah ﷺ say: ‘When a judge rules and exerts ijtihad and is correct, he receives two rewards; but when he rules and exerts ijtihad and errs, he still receives one reward.’”
164 – Yazid ibn al-Had said, “I related this hadith to Abu Bakr ibn Muhammad ibn ʿAmr ibn Hazm, and he said, ‘Abu Salamah narrated it to me in the same wording from Abu Hurayrah.’”
165 – Al-Shafiʿi commented, “So you hear me transmit it as: ‘If he exerts ijtihad and is correct, he has two rewards; and if he exerts ijtihad and errs, he has one.’”