of any of the other distinguished Companions—may Allah be pleased with them all—to indulge in such belated juridical hair-splitting while he was witnessing the people in the grip of crushing hardship and anguish, misery and wretchedness, on the verge of perishing from hunger and thirst because the water had dried up, the livestock had died, and the earth was stripped of crops and greenery—so much so that the year was named the Year of the Ashes (ʿĀm al-Ramādah)? How could such legal philosophizing possibly cross his mind in that harrowing situation, leading him to forgo in his supplication the supreme means—namely, seeking intercession through the Greatest Prophet ﷺ, were that permissible—and to adopt instead the lesser means, incomparable to the first, namely, seeking intercession through al-ʿAbbās, and all this for nothing except to show people that they may resort to a less excellent intermediary when a more excellent one is present?!

What is plain and well known is that when a severe trial befalls someone, he instinctively clings to the strongest means available to ward it off, leaving the lesser means for times of ease. Even the pagan idol-worshippers understood this: in times of prosperity they would call upon their idols, yet in times of distress they would abandon them and call upon Allah alone, as the Exalted said: “And when they embark on a ship they call upon Allah, dedicating the religion sincerely to Him; but when He delivers them safely to land, behold, they associate others with Him.” ⦗1⦘

From this we learn that by his very nature the human being seeks help from the Supreme Power and the greatest means when calamities and disasters strike, whereas he may resort to the lesser means during times of safety and comfort—and it is only then that the legal ruling they have imagined might occur to him, namely, that it is permissible to seek the intercession of the less excellent while the more excellent is present. And the matter