the Azāriqah.”
Al-Zuhrī said:
“No innovation introduced into Islam has been more harmful to its people than irjā’.”
Al-Awzā‘ī said:
“Yahyā ibn Abī Kathīr and Qatādah used to say that no deviant doctrine, in their view, posed a greater threat to the community than irjā’.”
Sharīk the judge, mentioning the Murji’ah, said:
“They are the most wicked people. The Rāfidah are wicked enough, but the Murji’ah tell lies about Allah.”
Sufyān al-Thawrī said:
“The Murji’ah have left Islam thinner than Sābirī cloth.”
Qatādah said: “Irjā’ only arose after the turmoil involving Ibn al-Ash‘ath’s faction.”
Maymūn ibn Mihrān was asked about the doctrine of the Murji’ah and replied: “I am older than that.” Sa‘īd ibn Jubayr said to Dharr al-Hamdānī: “Are you not ashamed of holding a view younger than yourself?” Ayyūb al-Sakhtiyānī said: “I am older than the religion of the Murji’ah. The first person to speak of irjā’ was a man from Medina, of Banū Hāshim, called al-Hasan.”
Zādhān said:
“We went to al-Hasan ibn Muhammad and asked, ‘What is this treatise you have written?’ He was the one who had published the Murji’ah’s treatise. He said to me, ‘Abū ‘Umar, I wish I had died before publishing this treatise—or writing this treatise.’”
An error concerning the designation of faith is not like an error in the name of a hadith transmitter, or in other names, since the rulings of this world and the Hereafter hinge upon the designations of faith, Islam, disbelief, and hypocrisy.
Ahmad—may Allah be pleased with him—distinguished between knowledge in the heart and assent in the heart, for assent expressed by the tongue is verbal profession. He mentioned three things, and this admits two interpretations. He may be distinguishing between the heart’s assent and its knowledge, and this is the view of