and other such statements that no scholar had ever made before.

Perhaps some of those heedless people will awaken from their heedlessness and return to sound judgment when they see that the Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him, did not approve of the Companions’—may Allah be pleased with them—disagreement over identifying what Ibn Ṣayyād had said: was it al-dukh or al-zakh? Although, as is evident, such a disagreement has absolutely no connection with religion. Perhaps, once they awaken to this, it will become clear to them that he, peace and blessings be upon him, did not approve of their disagreement in matters of religion, much less endorse it.

The truth is that disagreement—the kind which Ibn Taymiyyah, may Allah have mercy on him, calls mutually contradictory disagreement—is a bane, not a mercy.

It is enough for the Muslim who has insight into his religion to excuse those who differ on reasonable grounds and to believe that they are all rewarded, in accordance with the detail stated in the hadith. But to endorse disagreement itself and defend it on the pretext of defending the imams—as some of them proclaim on certain Islamic radio stations—is to mislead people and to confuse truth with falsehood. We ask Allah to safeguard our religion and our minds.

3257 — “No one with even a mustard seed’s weight of arrogance in his heart will enter Paradise.”

It was narrated by ʿAbd Allāh ibn Aḥmad in Zawāʾid al-Zuhd (p. 182); by al-Aṣbahānī in al-Targhīb (65/1–2) (1/270/600, ed.)—whose version contains the additional wording; and likewise by al-Ṭabarānī in al-Kabīr (13/147/363), through [Ismāʿīl ibn] Sinān—that is, al-ʿUṣfurī. It was also narrated by al-Ḥākim (3/416) and al-Kharāʾiṭī in al-Masāwiʾ (265), through Sālim ibn Ibrāhīm, the keeper of the Qur’anic codices; and by al-Aṣbahānī as well (245/1) (2/956/2331, ed.), through ʿUmar ibn