knowledge, and it is just as impermissible to issue legal rulings based on such conjecture as it is to embrace it in matters of creed; there is no distinction between the two.

Since this is so, our earlier conclusion stands: every verse and hadith previously cited that enjoins acceptance of solitary reports (ḥadīth al-āḥād) in legal rulings, by their general wording and all-embracing scope, likewise enjoins accepting them in matters of belief. The truth is that separating creed from law in the obligation to act upon solitary reports is an alien piece of philosophizing, unknown to the righteous predecessors and to the four Imams whom the vast majority of Muslims follow today.

Their “doctrine” of rejecting solitary reports rests on illusion and fancy:

One of the strangest claims an intelligent Muslim hears nowadays is the slogan so often repeated by preachers and writers whenever their faith falters before a hadith—even when that hadith is, in the judgment of the hadith scholars, mass-transmitted, such as the report of Jesus’ descent at the end of time. They seek cover behind the statement, “A solitary report cannot establish doctrine.” The irony is that this very statement is itself a doctrine, as I once remarked to some of my interlocutors on the question. Accordingly, they must produce conclusive proof for the soundness of their claim; otherwise they fall into self-contradiction. Yet far from it—far from it! They possess no evidence beyond a mere assertion, an argument unacceptable even in legal matters, so how could it be admissible in matters of creed?

In other words, indeed