[The Rāfidī’s charge against Abū Bakr that he neglected Allah’s prescribed penalties by failing to exact retribution from Khālid ibn al-Walīd, and the response to it]

(Section) (1)

The Rāfidī (2) said:

“He neglected Allah’s prescribed penalties: he neither exacted retribution from Khālid ibn al-Walīd nor imposed the prescribed punishment upon him when (3) he killed Mālik ibn Nuwayra, who was a Muslim (4), married his wife [on] (5) the night he killed him, and had intercourse with her. Umar advised him (6) to execute Khālid, but he did not do so.” (7)

The response is as follows:

First, it should be said: If an imam may be censured for failing to execute the killer of someone whose life is inviolable, this would be among the strongest arguments of Uthmān’s supporters against Alī. Uthmān was better than an earth full of men like Mālik ibn Nuwayra. He was the caliph of the Muslims and was wrongfully killed as a martyr, without any interpretation that could justify his killing. Yet Alī did not execute his killers, and this was among the foremost reasons why Uthmān’s supporters withheld their pledge of allegiance from Alī;