armies included very large numbers of Yemenis and Qaysis (1). Most of Yemen’s title-holders bearing the name Dhū were with Muʿāwiya, such as Dhū Kulāʿ (2), Dhū ʿAmr, Dhū Ruʿayn, and others like them. They are known collectively as the Dhawīn.
As the poet said:
I do not thereby mean the two lesser among them …
Rather, by it I mean the Dhawīn.
The Sixth Point:
The words, “Allah will bring forth a people whom He loves and who love Him,” are unrestricted and specify no particular individual. They encompass anyone who possesses these qualities, whoever he may be; they are exclusive neither to Abū Bakr nor to Alī. Since this is not exclusive to either of them, it cannot be one of Alī’s distinctive merits. This therefore disproves the claim that it makes him superior to anyone who shares it with him—much less that it establishes his entitlement to the Imamate.
Rather, this verse indicates that, until the Day of Resurrection, whenever anyone apostasizes [from the religion] (3), Allah will raise up a people whom He loves and who love Him, humble toward the believers and mighty against the unbelievers, who will fight these apostates.
Apostasy may consist in abandoning the very foundation of Islam, as is the case with the extremist factions among the Nusayris and Ismailis. Such people are apostates by agreement of Ahl al-Sunnah and the Shīʿa, as are the ʿAbbāsiyya (4).
(1) M reads: “a multitude.”
(2) M reads: “such as Dhū al-Kulāʿ.”
(3) The words “from the religion” are an addition in M.
(4) N, M, and S read: “like the ʿAbbāsiyya.” By this, Ibn Taymiyya means the Rāwandiyya. As previously noted (1/14), they are followers of Ibn al-Rāwandī, who had been one of the leading Muʿtazilites before parting ways with them, attacking their doctrine, and becoming an atheist and a *zindīq* (heretic). The Rāwandiyya are several sects belonging to the Kaysāniyya. Ibn al-Nawbakhtī states in *Firaq al-Shīʿa* (*The Sects of the Shīʿa*), p. 57: “The Kaysāniyya as a whole have no imam and merely await the dead, except the ‘ʿAbbāsiyya,’ who affirm the imamate among the descendants of al-ʿAbbās and have kept it within that lineage to this day.” Earlier (p. 54), Ibn al-Nawbakhtī states: “Another faction held that ʿAbd Allāh ibn Muhammad ibn al-Hanafiyya designated Muhammad ibn ʿAlī ibn ʿAbd Allāh ibn al-ʿAbbās ibn ʿAbd al-Muttalib as his successor, because he died among them in the territory of al-Sharāt in Syria. He entrusted the testament to Muhammad’s father, ʿAlī ibn ʿAbd Allāh ibn al-ʿAbbās, since Muhammad ibn ʿAlī was still young when Abū Hāshim died. He instructed the father to hand it over to Muhammad when he came of age, and he did so. Thus he is the imam; he is Allah, Mighty and Majestic, and he knows all things. Whoever recognizes him may do whatever he wishes.” These are the extremist Rāwandiyya. See my earlier discussion of the Rāwandiyya at 1/14 and 1/500. See also Ibn Hazm’s discussion in *al-Fisal*, 4/154, where he states: “One faction held that the caliphate may be held only by descendants of al-ʿAbbās ibn ʿAbd al-Muttalib; they are the Rāwandiyya.” I quoted his words earlier at 1/500–503. See also 1/546 and *Usūl al-Dīn* (*Foundations of Religion*), p. 281.