Accordingly, the very deed performed by the one who acted on his interpretation is, in itself, forbidden; yet the legal consequences of that prohibition do not accrue to him, because Allah has pardoned him—He does not burden any soul beyond its capacity.

A second formulation is that, for him, the deed is not forbidden at all, because the proof of its prohibition never reached him. Although it remains unlawful for others, the actual movement carried out by that person is, in his case, not prohibited.

The difference between the two positions is slight—almost a mere variation in wording.

This is what can be said about the hadiths of threat when they concern a point of juristic disagreement. The scholars unanimously employ such texts to prove the prohibition of the deed that is threatened with punishment, whether the issue is one of consensus or of dispute. In fact, they most often need to adduce them precisely in contentious matters.

They have, however, differed over using those texts to establish the threatened punishment itself when the reports are not definitive, as we have already explained.

If someone objects, “Why, then, did you not assert that the hadiths of threat pertain only to matters of consensus and not to those disputed—so that every deed whose doer is cursed or threatened with wrath or punishment would be interpreted as an act unanimously agreed to be forbidden? That way, no jurisconsult would fall under the threat when he performs what he believes to be permissible. Indeed, holding such a belief is even more emphatic than merely committing the act, for he is the one who enjoins it.”