It has also been said that this Abū Hāshim wrote a book for which he was censured. Neither his brother nor the members of his household agreed with him concerning it, and he did not receive it from his father.
In any event, the book attributed to al-Hasan contradicts what is attributed (1) to Abū Hāshim. Each of them is said to have recanted his position (2). It is impossible that the two of them received these contradictory positions from their father, Muhammad ibn al-Hanafiyyah, and there is no more reason to attribute one of those positions to Muhammad than the other. Thus, any categorical assertion that Muhammad ibn al-Hanafiyyah held either of these two positions is invalid.
Rather, what is certain (3) is that Muhammad, though entirely free of the doctrine of the Murji’ah, was even further removed from the doctrine of the Mu‘tazilah. His father, ‘Alī, was even further removed than he was from both the Mu‘tazilah and the Murji’ah.
As for al-Ash‘arī, there is no doubt that he was a disciple of Abū ‘Alī al-Jubbā’ī, but he
(1) N, M: “what was attributed.”
(2) In his biographical notice on al-Hasan ibn Muhammad ibn al-Hanafiyya in *Tahdhīb al-Tahdhīb*, 2:320–321, Ibn Hajar states that he was the first to discuss *irjā’*. He then writes: “Sallām ibn Abī Mutī reported from Ayyūb: ‘I disavow *irjā’*. The first person to discuss it was a man from Medina named al-Hasan ibn Muhammad.’ Atā ibn al-Sāib reported from Zādhān and Maysara that they visited al-Hasan ibn Muhammad and reproached him for the treatise he had composed on *irjā’*. He said to Zādhān, ‘Abū Amr, I wish I had died without writing it.’” Ibn Hajar states that al-Hasan died in 99 or 100 AH, although other dates have also been reported. He then explains that the *irjā’* discussed by al-Hasan was different from the form of *irjā’* concerning *īmān* (faith) that Ahl al-Sunna condemn. Ibn Hajar says that he had seen the aforementioned treatise and found that al-Hasan deferred judgment concerning those who came after Abū Bakr and Umar. He also held that one should not declare categorically whether either of the two factions that fought during the *fitna* (civil conflict) was in error or in the right. Ibn Hajar then says: “As for the *irjā’* concerning *īmān*, he did not address it.”
(3) N, S, B: *anhu* (“from him” or “concerning him”).