Further confirmation of the sense I have attributed to Imām Aḥmad’s words is found in Shaykh ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn al-Mardāwī’s work al-Insāf fī Maʿrifat al-Rājiḥ min al-Khilāf ʿalā Madhhab al-Imām al-Mubajjal Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal. He says—may Allah have mercy on him—in volume 1, page 402, while explaining Aḥmad’s earlier statement, “Summon him three times”:

“The one who issues the summons is the ruler or his deputy. If the man had missed many prayers before he was summoned, he is neither to be executed nor declared an unbeliever, according to the sound position of the school. This is the view of the majority of our scholars, and many of them state it categorically.”

Among those who adopted this position is Abū ʿAbd Allāh Ibn Baṭṭah, as Shaykh Abū al-Faraj ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Qudāmah al-Maqdisī relates in his al-Sharḥ al-Kabīr ʿalā al-Muqniʿ of Imām Muwaffaq al-Dīn al-Maqdisī (1/385). Ibn Qudāmah adds that Ibn Baṭṭah rejected the view that such a person is an unbeliever, and he comments:

“This is the opinion of most jurists, including Abū Ḥanīfah, Mālik, and al-Shāfiʿī.”

He then marshals numerous hadiths in support, most of which are cited by Ibn al-Qayyim, among them the ḥadīth of ʿUbādah already mentioned in Ibn Taymiyyah’s discussion, after which he states: “Had he been an unbeliever, he would not have been left to Allah’s will.”

I add: this is also confirmed by the ḥadīth of the Book and the ḥadīth of ʿĀʾishah. ⦗48⦘