that are less well-founded, as well as weak arguments, such as hadiths that are not reliably established and analogies that do not consistently hold. This is to be considered alongside what people of insight know: everyone’s statements may be accepted or rejected except those of the Messenger of Allah, may Allah bless him and grant him peace. This applies especially to later generations of the Muslim community who have not attained a firm knowledge and understanding of the Book and the Sunnah, nor learned to distinguish sound hadiths from unsound ones and analogies that yield valid conclusions from those that do not. Added to this are the dominance of personal desires, the proliferation of opinions, the intensification of disagreement and division, and the emergence of hostility and discord.

These and similar causes intensify the “ignorance and injustice” with which Allah described man when He said:

“Yet man undertook it. Indeed, he was most unjust and ignorant.”

When Allah blesses a person with knowledge and justice, He rescues him from this misguidance. He, glorified be He, has said:

“By time, indeed, mankind is in loss, except those who believe and do righteous deeds, and counsel one another to uphold the truth and counsel one another to be patient.”

And He, Most High, has said:

“And We made from among them leaders guiding by Our command when they were patient and firmly believed in Our signs.”

You know—may Allah set your affairs aright—that the “Sunnah” which must be followed, whose adherents are praised and whose opponents are censured, is the Sunnah of the Messenger of Allah, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, in matters of belief, worship, and all other religious matters. It can only be known through knowledge of the reliably established hadiths of the Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, concerning his words and deeds, and the words and deeds from which he refrained; then through knowledge of the way followed by the earliest believers and those who followed them in righteousness.