authenticate reports that, in their view, bolster irjāʾ?

By God, it is one of the gravest offenses that people who are unqualified should intrude upon this science and declare weak what the scholars have judged sound. This authentic ḥadīth teaches us that ignorance may reach such a level that some individuals know nothing of Islam except the testimony of faith. It does not mean that they are aware of the obligation of prayer and the rest of the pillars yet choose to neglect them—nothing in the report indicates that. Rather, they are like many desert-dwellers or new Muslims living in non-Muslim lands who know only the two testimonies.

Something similar can even be encountered in certain capital cities. A man once phoned me about a woman he had married who would pray without ever performing the ritual bath after intercourse. More recently, an imam—who considers himself learned enough to oppose the scholars—asked me about his own son: after reaching puberty and experiencing a seminal emission, the boy continued to pray while in a state of major impurity because he did not know that the ghusl is obligatory.

Ibn Taymiyyah said in Majmūʿ al-Fatāwā (22/41): ⦗54⦘