The fourth cause is that the evidence has reached him, but he understands it in a sense other than the one intended.

We shall give two examples of this: the first from the Book and the second from the Sunnah.

1—From the Quran: the Most High says, “If you are ill or on a journey, or one of you comes from the privy, or you have touched women and cannot find water, then turn to clean earth…” 1 The scholars—may Allah have mercy on them—differed over the meaning of “or you have touched women.” Some understood it to mean any physical contact whatsoever; others understood it to mean contact that arouses desire; and still others understood it to mean sexual intercourse. This was the view of Ibn Abbas—may