and fatwas that the majority are unbelievers and apostates, that their land is an abode of apostasy whose liquids he rules ritually impure, and that if one of their own adopts the majority’s position and then repents, his repentance is not accepted, because a return to Islam is not accepted [from] (1) an apostate born a Muslim.
This view concerning one who apostatizes from Islam was held by some of the Salaf, and it is also reported in one narration from Imam Ahmad. They said: “That is because an apostate is someone who had been an unbeliever, embraced Islam, and then returned to unbelief, unlike someone born a Muslim.”
These people applied this to the rest of the ummah: in their view, they are unbelievers, and any one of their own who adopts the majority’s school is deemed an apostate.
This verse is evidence against them, for it was first addressed to the believers who were with the Prophet—may Allah bless him and grant him peace. They were told:
“Let not the believers take the disbelievers as allies instead of the believers.”
[Surah Āl Imrān: 28]
This verse is Medinan by scholarly consensus, for the whole of Surah Āl Imrān is Medinan, as are al-Baqarah, al-Nisā, and al-Mā’idah.
It is well known that, during the Prophet’s lifetime—may Allah bless him and grant him peace—none of the believers in Medina concealed his faith or represented himself to the disbelievers as one of them, as the Rāfidah do with the majority.
The Quran commentators agree that it was revealed because some Muslims wished to display affection toward the disbelievers and were forbidden to do so. Yet they do not display affection toward the majority. According to al-Dahhāk’s report from Ibn Abbās, Ubādah ibn al-Sāmit had allies among the