for they are among the most ignorant of all people, the least knowledgeable about religion, the furthest from following it, and the most given to following conjecture and their own desires.

They divide people into four categories: yāl, bā‘, dāshmand, and tāt—that is, their friend, their enemy, the scholar, and the common person. Whoever submits to their rule of ignorance and their unbelieving practices is their friend. Whoever opposes them is their enemy, even if he is one of Allah’s prophets, messengers, or close servants. They call everyone associated with learning or religion a “dāshmand”: the jurist, ascetic, priest, monk, Jewish dannān, astrologer, sorcerer, physician, scribe, and accountant. They even include the custodian of idols. Thus, they include in this category untold numbers of polytheists, People of the Book, and followers of religious innovations, and treat the people of knowledge and faith as just one category.

Indeed, they make the Qarmatians—godless esotericists, heretics, and hypocrites such as al-Tūsī and his like—the rulers over everyone associated with learning or religion among the Muslims, Jews, and Christians. Likewise, their foolish minister, given the title al-Rashīd, exercises authority over these groups and gives precedence to the worst of the Muslims, such as the Rāfidīs and the godless, over the best of the Muslims—the people of knowledge and faith. This went so far that the office of chief judge came to be held by someone closer to heresy, religious deviation, and disbelief in Allah and His Messenger, whose willingness to accommodate the wishes of the unbelievers and hypocrites among the Jews, Qarmatians, godless, and Rāfidīs was greater than that of others.