And if the complaint is against people of knowledge and religion (1)—those who have wronged no one and assisted no wrongdoer, but merely state, regarding knowledge and practice, what ought to be said on the basis of proofs that disclose the truth—then no one possessing even the slightest reason can doubt that (2) whoever likens men such as Mālik, al-Awzāī, al-Thawrī, Abū Hanīfah, al-Layth ibn Sa‘d, al-Shāfiī, Ahmad, Ishāq, and their peers to men such as Hishām ibn al-Hakam, Hishām ibn Sālim, and their peers among the leading Rāfidī authorities is among the most unjust of wrongdoers.
The same applies to anyone who likens al-Mufīd ibn al-Nu‘mān, al-Karājikī (3), and their peers to men such as Abū Alī, Abū Hāshim, Qādī Abd al-Jabbār, and Abū al-Husayn (4) al-Basrī: he is among the most unjust of wrongdoers. Those men were leading Mu‘tazilī authorities—let alone Muhammad ibn al-Haysam (5) and his peers, and Qādī Abū Bakr ibn al-Tayyib and his peers among the scholastic theologians who affirmed the divine attributes; and let alone scholars of jurisprudence, hadith, and Sufism, such as Abū Hāmid al-Isfarāyīnī, Abū Zayd al-Marwazī, Abū Abd Allāh ibn Hāmid (6), [Abū Abd Allāh] ibn Battah (7), Abū Bakr Abd al-Azīz, Abū Bakr al-Rāzī, [and Abū al-Husayn al-Qudūrī] (8), Abū Muhammad ibn Abī Zayd, Abū Bakr al-Abharī, and Abū