Exiting the Sect’s Fiqhi Circle
 

They also objected to us by saying that we have accused someone of having exited the sect’s circle when we said that the mass of so many odd verdicts causes one to get out of the fiqhi circle of the sect to which he belongs. The truth of the matter is that contradicting what is well known, no matter how much, does not obligate such exiting. We would like to add by saying the following:

 

1. Even a beginner student knows the difference between odd verdicts and verdicts which contradict what is well known, regardless of the individuals’ conditions, and regardless of the direct verdict against them, be it negative or positive.

2. What I have indicated is merely a precaution resulting from so many such odd verdicts. I did not discuss the criterion of fiqh, about capacity, depth and affiliation, and that it is the method followed by the faqah according to his restrictions and the onsets of his deduction, then according to the general stamp which distinguishes his verdicts. All this does not suffice this scholar with regard to these verdicts or to his agreement with others with regard to their verdicts. We may find a fiqhi sect among non-Imamite Sha`as generally agreeing with a sundry and odd verdicts, or sometimes they are not odd, adhered to by a Sha`i faqah here and another there despite the obvious difference in the methodology, onsets and similar characteristics. Such characteristics do not place them in a [separate] sect. So there is no benefit whatever gained by someone who keeps saying that so-and-so agrees with him or with this verdict of his or with that.