forbid what He has forbidden, unless doing so serves their desires. They then act for the sake of those desires, not in worship of their Lord. Thus, they do not denounce the disbelief, wickedness and disobedience that occur in the world unless these conflict with their own aims. Their denunciation is then instinctive and satanic, not grounded in divine law and obedience to the Most Merciful. Consequently, their brethren, the devils, attach themselves to them and draw them further into error, never relenting. The devils may also appear to them in visible forms, speak to them and help them fulfil some of their desires, just as they used to do with the polytheists who worshipped idols.

Such people are numerous among groups that depart from the Book and Sunnah with which Allah sent His Messenger. They follow paths of worship and belief that are innovations in religion, without striving to conform to the Messenger or adhere firmly to the Book and Sunnah in their worship and beliefs. Consequently, desires and specious doubts proliferate among them, and the devils lead them astray. They come to resemble the polytheists in proportion to their distance from the Messenger. Just as the doctrine of the Qadariyyah, who resemble the Magians, must be rejected, rejecting the doctrine of these people is even more necessary, and refuting them still more warranted.

These people did not exist in the time of the Companions and those who followed them in righteousness. Religious innovations emerge successively, with the less serious appearing first. Thus, the innovations of the Khawārij and the Shīʿah arose towards the end of the era of the Rightly Guided Caliphs; then the innovations of the Murjiʾah and the Qadariyyah arose towards the end of the era of the Companions; then the innovation of the Jahmiyyah, who deny the divine attributes, arose towards the end of the era of the Successors. As for these antinomians, who discard commands and prohibitions and invoke divine decree to justify doing so, they are worse than all these groups, and emerged only after all of them.