And it escaped them also that this speech of his has a meaning whose understanding was hidden from them, and that it is not as they imagine—that his detester and the one who exaggerates in his love to the degree of saying [and believing in] worship are equal in disbelief, and that the destiny of both of them together is to the eternal Fire, not at all, but rather the meaning of that is that the destruction of his detester is by his containment in the Blaze in the afterlife in return for his hatred, and the destruction of the extremist concerning him is by his killing and his torture in the worldly life by the enemies of truth, the correctness of that is indicated by the saying of Ibrahim al-Nazzam, and he is an outwardist Mu'tazilite, he said: “We were bewildered concerning Ali bin Abi Talib, if we detested him we disbelieved, and if we loved him we were killed,” so in disbelief is destruction and killing is destruction.

And the tracker of the pages of history sees what befell the followers of our master—His might was mighty—described as extremists, of the types of killing and torture and forms of pressure and tyranny, and making them the subject of mockery and throwing [accusations] of atheism in the permanent, continuous form, and the observer from close quarters sees what they passed through of harsh phases and arbitrary stages, poverty, affliction, hardship, misery, trials, and adversities, of what the substance of the saying of Allah, Glory be to Him, applies to them: [“And We will surely test you until We make evident those who strive among you and the patient, and We will test your affairs.”] ¹ , and the Creator is too exalted to take His creation with injustice, and does it befit His right, Glory be to Him, to take those extremists with destruction in the world and the afterlife according to the saying of the sayers—that the destruction of the extremist lover is by torture in the afterlife after the precedence of their torture