Muāwiyah said to Ibn Abbās, “Do you adhere to Alī’s creed?” He replied, “I adhere neither to Alī’s creed nor to Uthmān’s creed. I adhere to the creed of the Messenger of Allah—may Allah bless him and grant him peace.”

The Shīʿah—Alī’s followers—gave precedence over him to Abū Bakr and Umar. The dispute was only over whether Alī took precedence over Uthmān. At that time, no one was called either an Imāmī or a Rāfidī] (1). They came to be called the Rāfidah, and became the Rāfidah, (2) when Zayd ibn Alī ibn al-Husayn rose up in Kufa during the caliphate of Hishām. The Shīʿah asked him about Abū Bakr and Umar, and he prayed that Allah have mercy upon them. A group then rejected him, so he said:

“You have rejected me! You have rejected me!”

They were therefore called the Rāfidah. Another group remained loyal to him and were called the Zaydīs [because they affiliated themselves with him] (3). From that time onward, the Shīʿah divided into the Imāmī Rāfidah and the Zaydīs. The further they went into religious innovation, the further they went into evil. The Zaydīs are therefore better than the Rāfidah: more knowledgeable, more truthful, more ascetic, and more courageous.

Then, after Abū Bakr, comes Umar [ibn al-Khattāb], and he was (4) one who was not affected when it came to—