Thus, night and day, he hastens to repudiate the Book of Allah, Most High, and the sunnah of His Messenger, peace and blessings be upon him, and to assail them; or he disputes against them through far-fetched interpretations; or he brings his own opinion to bear, by means of flimsy invented specious arguments, against whatever does not conform to his doctrine—until the Book and the sunnah are made to agree with his doctrine. Yet how far that is from being possible!

Had he taken the way of the believers and followed the path of those who adhere to the truth, he would have built his doctrine upon the Book and the sunnah and taken them as his guide. But he has been turned away and diverted from all good. Such is his state when he busies himself with disputation concerning the Book and the sunnah.

But when he returns to the foundation upon which he built his innovation, he objects to them with outright denial and rejection; he sets one part of them against another without insight; he confronts their very foundation with the falsehoods of dialectical argument and speculative reasoning, without reflection; and he proceeds to mock and feign astonishment, without taking heed—thereby ridiculing the verses of Allah and His wisdom, and daring to affront the religion and sunnah of the Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be upon him. He sets them both against the opinions of al-Naẓẓām and al-ʿAllāf