‘Ubayd ibn Yaʿīsh narrated to us; he said: Yūnus ibn Bukayr narrated to us; Muhammad ibn Isḥāq narrated from al-Zuhrī, from Muḥammad ibn Jubayr ibn Muṭʿim, from his father, who said:

“I came to the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) to ransom some of his captives. I fell asleep in the mosque after the ʿAṣr (late-afternoon) prayer while I was still a polytheist. By Allah, nothing woke me except the recitation of the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) in the Maghrib prayer: ‘By the Mount, and by a Book inscribed’ (al-Ṭūr 52:1-2).”

Abū ʿAbd Allāh said: “Nuʿaym ibn Ḥammād made it plain that the Speech of the Lord is uncreated, and that the Arabs recognize the living and the dead only through action: whoever has action is alive, and whoever has no action is dead. He also stated that the deeds of the servants are created. Because of this they restricted him until he passed on to his Lord, and the scholars were pained by what befell him. The consensus of the Muslims proves that Nuʿaym and those who follow his path are neither dissenters nor innovators. Rather, innovation and the leadership of ignorance belong more rightly to others—those who issue legal opinions based on conflicting notions that Allah has never authorized.”