him and grant him peace, exalted be He—and from which knowledge and faith spread, were five: the two Sacred Cities, the two Iraqi cities, and Syria. From them spread the Quran, hadith, jurisprudence, worship, and the other related aspects of Islam. Innovations concerning the foundations of religion arose in these centres, except for the Prophet’s city. Shiism and the doctrine of the Murjiʾah arose in Kufa and subsequently spread elsewhere. Qadarism, Muʿtazilism, and corrupt asceticism arose in Basra and subsequently spread elsewhere. In Syria there was hostility toward the Prophet’s family, as well as Qadarism.

As for Jahmism, it emerged only from the region of Khurasan, and it is the worst of innovations. The emergence of innovations corresponded to the distance from the Prophet’s city. When division arose after the killing of ʿUthmān, the innovation of the Harūriyyah appeared. Punitive measures had already been prescribed against the three categories of Shīʿah: the extremists, whom ʿAlī burned with fire; those who accorded him precedence, for whom he prescribed eighty lashes; and the Sabaʾiyyah, whom he threatened, seeking to punish Ibn Sabaʾ with death or otherwise, whereupon Ibn Sabaʾ fled from him. Then, toward the end of the era of the Companions, the Qadariyyah emerged, late in the lifetime of Ibn ʿUmar