From what has preceded in this report, we can see the clarity in the speech of the scholars, which is when refuting openly and warning people against a deviant and innovator, then prohibitively and emphatically, his good points are not mentioned.

The reasons are that this is methodology is not supported by the Qurʾān and the Sunnah or the way of Salaf and it compromises the actual objective behind the warning, it also weakens the refutation and also gives people a justification to remain attached to and continue taking from the one refuted or warned against.

During the 2000s, after these affairs had remained clear, people like ʿAlī Ḥasan al-Ḥalabī and before him, Abū al-Ḥasan al-Maʾribī came along and tried to introduce confusion, new principles, or restrictions and expansions to known principles, in order to undermine that clarity and thereby justify what they themselves were doing of maintaining connections and interactions with the jamʿiyyāt of ḥizbiyyah, and individuals whose misguidance and error had been made clear for long by the Major Scholars. They claimed they were still advising and being gentle in order to guide these people, even though the time of advice had long expired after these people rejected truth.

From the ways that ʿAlī Ḥasan al-Ḥalabī caused confusion is that he took the speech of Shaykh Ibn Bāz (رحمه الله) in particular and made up some exceptions, while muddling the context of refutations and the context of writing biographical details, despite this distinction being very clear in the speech of the scholars.

In one of his works, after relying on two particular statements of Shaykh Ibn Bāz (found earlier in the report), he provides the following summary of the issue:

He says:

Observations:

01  What al-Ḥalabī has done is to take two statements of Shaykh Ibn Bāz in which the Shaykh made clear tafṣīl (detail, distinction), and left them to be understood as being generalised, while also not sufficiently distinguishing between the context of refutation, criticism and warning and the context of making biographical accounts for purposes of historical record, to avoid confusing the reader.

So there are two mistakes here.

02  As for the first, which is leaving the speech of Shaykh Ibn Bāz to be understood as generalised, then the Shaykh made each of the two scenarios in question quite clear.

The first scenario is when, in the course of refuting an individual, someone who is listening asks a question in order to know and verify areas of agreement and differing with the one being refuted, having a particular reason to do so. It could be a case that he took knowledge from the one being refuted and wished to find out areas in which his knowledge may be compromised.

So in this case, the one refuting may mention areas in which that person has truth, and agrees with Ahl al-Sunnah.

As for the second scenario, then Shaykh Ibn Bāz distinguished between open warning and refutation of an innovator or deviant, and when one is speaking directly to the one being refuted, from the angle of advice, that in order to encourage him, you remind him of the good he has, so he finds it easier to repent and return to the truth. Here, this is from the angle of enjoining the good and prohibiting the evil in relation to a person.

Al-Ḥalabī did not clarify this and left the matter open for a person to understand that the general prohibition he mentioned first can be opposed and departed from.

Hence, when a person is openly refuting a deviant or innovator, in a lecture or gathering, he may choose to mention the good points of the one being refuted, so that when the one being refuted comes to hear his speech some time later, he will be more likely to accept the refutation, just because some of his good points have been mentioned in public.

So these are two details in the speech of Shaykh Ibn Bāz that al-Ḥalabī tried to portray as universal and which come down to the evaluation of a person, as to what constitutes a “need” and what constitutes the “maṣlaḥah” (beneficial interest), effectively allowing anyone to praise innovators and deviants because they saw a need or beneficial interest for it.

03  The second mistake is not sufficiently distinguishing between the context of biographical accounts and that of refuting and warning.

In what follows on from the passage quoted above from al-Ḥalabī, he adds a fifth matter which is that when a person is being evaluated overall, for biographical purposes, then his good points are mentioned as well.

Then he quoted statements from al-Ḍhahabī (رحمه الله) and Ibn ʿAbd al-Barr (رحمه الله) to the effect that there is no scholar except that he has flaws and errors, but that his errors are insignificant to the truth and goodness they have. They are speaking about scholars of Ahl al-Sunnah, who have errors and who might even have inadvertently fallen into innovation through faulty interpretation.

This is the quote from al-Ḍhahabī:

However, in the eyes of al-Ḥalabī and those upon his way, he includes within these statements, those whom the Major Scholars have refuted and warned against for their persistence upon error, innovation and misguidance, treating them as being from Ahl al-Sunnah with errors to whom these types of statements of al-Ḍhahabī and Ibn ʿAbd al-Barr are applied. Meaning, their errors (i.e. innovation and misguidance which they persisted upon) are to be balanced out with their goodness when they are spoken of or written about.

This is where caution needs to be taken with the writings of such people in that theoretically, and on the surface, what they write appears to be sound, but its only when you look at their other writings, behaviours, friendships and loyalties that you understand what they mean and how they apply their principles practically speaking.

It is then that you realise, they are not upon the way of the scholars, upon the correct understanding and application, even though they make it appear so.