of religious significance that outweighs the harm of performing the act. Otherwise, if an evil deed contains an outweighing good, it is not evil. If punishment entails harm greater than that of the crime, it is not good; rather, it is evil. If the harms are equal, it is neither good nor evil.

Thus, abandonment may aim at avoiding the evil of religious innovation, which constitutes wrongdoing, sin, transgression, and corruption. Alternatively, shunning may aim at the good of jihad, forbidding wrong, and punishing wrongdoers so that they are deterred and restrained, and so that faith and righteous deeds are strengthened among those who uphold them.

Punishing a wrongdoer deters people from committing his wrongdoing and encourages them to pursue its opposite: faith, the Sunnah, and the like. If shunning him neither deters anyone nor causes anyone to desist, but instead prevents many commanded good deeds from being performed, then such shunning is not commanded. This is what Ahmad mentioned concerning the people of Khurāsān at that time: they lacked the strength to stand against the Jahmiyyah. When they were unable to show hostility towards them, the command to perform this good deed ceased to apply. Dealing tactfully with them would protect the weak believer from harm and might also win over the powerful evildoer. Likewise, when Qadarite doctrine became widespread among the people of Basra, abandoning the transmission of hadith from them would have caused the knowledge, Sunnah traditions, and transmitted reports preserved among them to die out.

If duties relating to knowledge, jihad, and other matters cannot be fulfilled except through someone whose religious innovation causes less harm than abandoning that duty, then securing the benefit of fulfilling the duty, despite the lesser harm accompanying it, is better than the reverse. For this reason, these questions require a nuanced discussion.