the threatened punishment, is more likely; hence this assumption is preferable.

On the strength of this argument, most scholars have given precedence to evidence indicating prohibition over evidence indicating permissibility. On this same basis, many jurists have relied on the argument from precaution in numerous rulings. As for exercising precaution in one’s actions, rational people virtually agree that it is generally commendable. Thus, if his fear of error in rejecting belief in the threatened punishment is balanced by his fear of error in not holding this belief, two unopposed arguments remain: the evidence requiring belief in it, and the deliverance attained through such belief.

No one may say: “The absence of conclusive evidence for the threatened punishment is evidence of its nonexistence, just as with the absence of mass-transmitted reports establishing readings beyond those contained in the Quranic codex.” For the absence of evidence does not establish the nonexistence of what it would indicate. Whoever categorically denies any matter of knowledge merely because there is no conclusive evidence for its existence—as is the approach of a group of speculative theologians—is plainly mistaken.

However, if we know that the existence of something necessarily entails the existence of evidence for it, and we know that this evidence is absent, we can categorically conclude that the thing entailing it does not exist. For the absence of a necessary consequence establishes the absence of that which entails it. We know that there are abundant motives for transmitting Allah’s Book and His religion, and that the Muslim community cannot collectively conceal what needs to be transmitted as universally binding proof. Thus, since neither a sixth prayer nor an additional surah has been transmitted on a widespread basis, we know with certainty that neither exists.