These Rāfidah, in (1) arguing that Alī is infallible on the grounds that those outside their ranks deny infallibility to anyone other than him, are merely arguing for their own assertion (2) by means of that same assertion and seeking to establish one unknown by another.

A related example is something I have seen in the books of their shaykhs: when they differ over an issue and hold two positions, one of whose proponents is known while the other’s is unknown, they regard the position whose proponent is unknown as the correct one. They say (3), “If its proponent is unknown, it must be one of the statements of the infallible one.” Is this anything but the grossest ignorance? How could it be known that the latter position—even though its proponent is unknown—was in fact stated by the infallible one?

Even if it were assumed that such an infallible person existed, it would still not be known (4) that he said it, just as it would not be known (5) that someone else said it. Why could the infallible one not have expressed the position whose proponent is known, with someone else also expressing it—just as he expresses many positions in which others concur with him—while the other position was voiced by someone who had no idea what he was saying, or indeed by a devil from among the devils of jinn and humankind? Thus, they make their lack of knowledge of a position and of its soundness into evidence of its soundness.

Likewise, they have said here that the absence of any assertion that someone else is infallible proves his infallibility; and likewise (6), they make their ignorance of a position’s proponent evidence that it is the statement of the infallible one. This (7) is the condition of anyone who turns away from the light of the sunnah with which Allah sent His Messenger: he falls into the darknesses of religious innovations—layers of darkness, one above another.