are guilty of a greater sin, and calling them to Islam and fighting them are more meritorious, assuming that those who fought ‘Alī were disbelievers.

If it is said, “They were apostates,” as the Rāfidah falsely claim, then it is well known that someone whose apostasy consists in believing in a messenger other than Muhammad, like the followers of Musaylimah the Liar, is guilty of graver apostasy than someone who refuses to acknowledge obedience to the ruler while still believing in the Messenger.

In any case, whatever sin may be attributed to those whom ‘Alī fought, the sin of those whom the three fought was greater. Likewise, whatever merit or reward may be ascribed to those who fought alongside ‘Alī, the merit and reward of those who fought alongside the three were greater.

This assumes that those whom ‘Alī fought were disbelievers. It is well known that this is a false view held only by the dregs of the Shia; their reasonable people do not hold it. It is established through mass-transmitted reports from ‘Alī and his household that they did not declare those who fought ‘Alī to be disbelievers. All of this, moreover, assumes that such fighting was commanded. Yet it is well known that the Companions and the scholars after them disputed whether this fighting constituted fighting rebels in which the condition making combat obligatory—the occurrence of fighting—had been met (1), or whether it did not fall into that category because the condition making combat obligatory was absent.

The position of the leading Companions and Successors is that the fighting at the Camel and Siffīn was not among the kinds of fighting that were commanded, and that refraining from it was better than taking part. Indeed, they regarded it as fighting amid civil strife.