and if he persists in neglecting what he has been commanded to follow of the Sunnah and doing what he has been forbidden, he may be punished by no longer being enabled to perform obligatory duties, to the point that he may become defiantly disobedient or an advocate of religious innovation. If he persists in major sins, there is reason to fear that he may be stripped of faith. Religious innovations continually lead a person from lesser to greater deviations, until they lead him into religious deviation and heresy. This has happened to more than one person who experienced spiritual states involving disclosures of hidden matters and the production of effects. We have known instances of this that this is not the place to recount.

The Sunnah is like Noah’s ark: whoever boards it is saved, and whoever stays behind drowns.

Al-Zuhrī said: “Those of our scholars who came before us used to say: Holding fast to the Sunnah is salvation.”

Generally, when you find someone who possesses a spiritual state involving disclosure of hidden matters or the production of effects, and who uses it to assist disbelievers or the wicked, or employs it in some other act of disobedience, that state is merely the result of acts of worship that are not prescribed. He is like someone who acquires wealth unlawfully and scarcely spends it on anything but disobedience to Allah.

Religious innovations are of two kinds: those involving statements and beliefs, and those involving deeds and acts of worship. The second kind entails the first, just as the first leads to the second. Those who associate themselves with knowledge, rational inquiry, and related pursuits are at risk of falling into the first kind if they do not hold fast to the Book and the Sunnah. Those who associate themselves with worship, rational inquiry, spiritual aspiration, and related pursuits are at risk if they do not hold fast to the Book