while others may reject them or confidently declare them false, to say nothing of those who are unaware of them or doubt them.

At other times, certainty comes through understanding the texts and knowing what they signify. How many people are ignorant of a text’s meaning, doubt it, understand it to mean the opposite, overlook it, or lack the intellectual ability to grasp it, while someone else has understood that text and gained certain knowledge from it!

At other times, it comes through knowledge of a consensus, whether among the Companions or others.

Then, beyond this, certainty may sometimes come through conclusive analogical reasoning. For analogy is of two kinds: conclusive and conjectural. A conclusive analogy is one in which the case under consideration is certainly equivalent to the original case, with no distinction between them recognized by the Sacred Law, or is certainly even more deserving of the same ruling.

At other times, certainty comes through ascertaining whether the basis of a ruling applies to a particular case. This, in turn, comes back to understanding the meaning of the text: one knows that the basis of the ruling, which is itself beyond doubt, is present in the particular case, while another doubts its presence. Thus, in matters of legal retribution and replacing destroyed property, someone may know with certainty that one option comes closer to equivalence and justice than another, while someone else questions this or believes the contrary. Other examples are similar.