the Book and the Sunnah is false and untrue, and therefore contradicts both revealed law and reason.

“And the word of your Lord has been fulfilled in truth and justice.”

When these people learned that Ahl al-Sunnah were known to qualify their profession of faith with “if Allah wills,” they thought this could only make sense if faith meant the faith upon which a servant dies and with which he meets his Lord. They therefore supposed that this was what faith meant to the early generations and began attributing this position to them. Yet none of the early generations held this position. Rather, these people attributed it to them on the basis of their own supposition, because they thought that the early generations’ statements could only be explained on this basis. They claim that the foundational doctrine of Jahm concerning faith, which they have defended, is the position of the discerning scholars and speculative thinkers among the scholars of hadith.

Such misrepresentation frequently occurs concerning the positions of the early generations: a speculative thinker opposes their position and sets out his argument against it without understanding what they actually held. Someone who knows these thinkers’ arguments but not those of the early generations, or who venerates them because he sees them as superior to himself, then says, “This is the position of the discerning scholars,” or, “The discerning scholars have said…” Yet the position in question may be false, contradicting reason as well as revealed law. This occurs frequently in the discourse of some innovators and some heretics.

Those whom Allah has granted knowledge and faith know that whatever depth of understanding and attainment the later generations possess falls short of that of the early generations, in both knowledge and practice. Anyone versed in theoretical and rational questions, as well as practical matters, knows that the position of the Companions is always sounder than that of those who came after them, and that whenever anyone introduces a novel position into Islam, it is mistaken, while someone before him has already arrived at the correct position.