Neither the Quran nor the Sunnah contains the designation “Nāsibīs” (1), “assimilationists,” or “Hashwiyya”; nor does either contain the designation “Rāfida.” When we use the term “Rāfida,” we do so for identification, because what this name denotes includes various matters condemned by the Quran and Sunnah: lying about Allah and His Messenger, rejecting the truth brought by His Messenger, showing enmity toward the allies of Allah—indeed, toward the best of His allies—and giving allegiance to the Jews, Christians, and polytheists, as the various grounds for censure make clear.

Ahl al-Sunnah wal-Jamāah can never, as a whole, fall under anything censured in the Quran and Sunnah in the way that the Rāfida do. Admittedly, blameworthy things may be found among some of them, but this does not entail condemning them all. Similarly, if there is among the Muslims someone who is blameworthy because of a sin he committed, it does not follow from that (2) that Islam and its adherents who uphold (3) its obligations are to be condemned.

The fourth point (4) is this: As for saying that Allah is or is not a body, this is a matter over which the practitioners of speculative theology and rational inquiry have disagreed, and it is a rational question. It has already been explained that people have taken three approaches to it: negation or affirmation, withholding judgment, and drawing a detailed distinction (5). This last approach is the correct one held by the Salaf and the imams.

For this reason, when Abū Īsā Barghūth put this argument to Ahmad during their debate, suggesting that if one says the Quran is uncreated, it necessarily follows that Allah is a body, because