Abū ʿIsmah reported:
“I asked Abū Hanīfah, ‘Who belongs to the community?’ He replied, ‘Whoever gives precedence to Abū Bakr and ʿUmar, loves ʿAlī and ʿUthmān, does not prohibit nabīdh (a drink made by steeping ingredients in water) prepared in earthenware jars, declares no one an unbeliever on account of a sin, accepts wiping over leather socks, believes that divine decree—both its good and its evil—is from Allah, and says nothing concerning Allah.’”

Khālid ibn Sabīh narrated that Abū Hanīfah said:
“Adherence to the community consists of seven things: giving precedence to Abū Bakr and ʿUmar, loving ʿUthmān and ʿAlī, offering the funeral prayer for anyone among the people of the qiblah who dies having committed a sin, and saying nothing concerning Allah.”

I say:
His statement in these two reports, “saying nothing concerning Allah,” is explained in the report transmitted by Abū Yūsuf: “One should not say anything concerning Allah on the basis of one’s own opinion; rather, one should describe Him as He has described Himself.” Thus, the imams condemn anyone who speaks about the Lord’s attributes on any basis other than what the Messenger conveyed.

How much more, then, does this apply to those who claim that the Book and the Sunnah do not yield knowledge, and give precedence to their own opinions over them, despite those opinions being unsound in many respects!

Hishām narrated from Muhammad, from Abū Hanīfah and Abū Yūsuf—and this was also Muhammad’s own position—that they said:
“The Sunnah upon which the community’s practice rests is that no one among the people of the qiblah should be declared an unbeliever and excluded from Islam on account of a sin; that a person should not doubt his religion, saying, ‘I do not know whether I am a believer or an unbeliever’; that he should not espouse the doctrine of the Qadariyyah; and that he should not rise up