Shaykh Rabīʿ bin Hādī (رحمه الله) said:
My advice to you is to study, when a person is spoken about, study him and take the statements of the critics, understand them and be sure about their authenticity. If that becomes clear to you, then let a person judge (thereafter) from a position of (full) awareness and satisfaction (with evidence), not out of blindly-following this one or that one, or showing fanaticism (bias, bigotry) for this one or that one.
Leave alone personalities, this one or that one.
Take this as a guiding principle and convey it to those opposers who disagree so that they understand the reality and know the truth, so that it takes them out of the embers of their fanaticism towards falsehood.
And I do not want anyone to be fanatical towards me. Never!
If I erred, then let whoever noticed my error tell me that I erred, may Allāh bless you. Do not be fanatical towards anyone, do not be fanatical to this or that one, not to Ibn Taymiyyah, nor to Ibn ʿAbd al-Wahhāb, nor to Aḥmad bin Ḥanbal, and nor to al-Shāfiʿī.
Indeed, (a person’s) zeal is for the truth, to respect the truth. It is a must to dislike error and to dislike falsehood.
01 The scholars of the Salafī manhaj attach people to the evidences of the Book, the Sunnah, and the way of the Salaf.
Shaykh Rabīʿ said:[1]
Thus, in particular arenas such as criticism, they base acceptance of speech upon verifiable evidences. This is what provides satisfaction and ends controversies. Had this not been the case, then there would be chaos and confusion all over the place.
02 This is why it has always been a distinguishing feature of the People of the Sunnah, that they provide convincing criticisms and refutations that are verifiably true, accurate, just and commensurate to the error(s) and that such criticisms provide satisfaction.
Thus, whoever has irjāʾ is justifiably described as a murjiʾ and whoever has khārijiyyah is justifiably described as a khārijī, and whoever has iʿtizāl is justifiably described as a muʿtazilī and whoever has ikhwāniyyah is justifiably described as an ikhwānī and so on, to all the other innovations and labels, where a person is correctly attributed with his orientation and the fountain from which he drinks.
This is why these criticisms and refutations have stood the test of time and have become established signposts on the path.
Had this not been the case, and the affairs proceeded upon bigotry to this one or that one, and aiding the cause of this one or that one, or because the tazkiyāt (commendations) for this one are greater or lesser than for that one and so on, things which in and of themselves are not determinants and verifications of truth, then there would be nothing but chaos and confusion.
03 The importance of returning back to the deeply-rooted scholars to acquire from them the foundations and clear principles of the Salafī methodology through which right guidance is acquired, thereby allowing a scale of measure to be adopted through which truth, guidance and right conduct are distinguished from what is other than them.