And the doctrine of these Rāfidis, who claim affiliation with the partisans of Alī [may Allah be pleased with him] (1)—namely, that someone other than the Messenger [may Allah bless him and grant him peace] (2) must be obeyed unconditionally in everything he commands—is more corrupt than the assertion of those among the people of Syria who were affiliated with the partisans of Uthmān [may Allah be pleased with him] (3), to the effect (4) that the ruler must be obeyed unconditionally. Those people obeyed a ruler who was present (5), whereas these people require obedience to an absent, infallible figure.

Moreover, those people did not claim for their leaders the infallibility claimed by the Rāfidis. Rather, they regarded them as being like the rightly guided caliphs and just leaders, who are followed in matters whose true nature is not known (6); or they would say, “Allah accepts their good deeds and overlooks their bad deeds.” This is less grave than the claim: “They are infallible and never err.”

It is thus clear that these partisans of Uthmān who are associated with nasb (hostility toward Alī), although there was