The Ruling on Responding to the People of Innovation and Publishing Those Responses

Question:
May Allah reward you. This brother, Abu Ahmad, in truth, Shaykh Salih al-Fawzan sent a good and beautiful question, and we want to elaborate on it. Brother Ahmad says: I love the Sunnah and I hate bid'ah (religious innovations) and superstitions, but Honorable Shaykh, the responses to the people of bid'ah and deviation—some people say that this was not the methodology of the Salaf, and that books of response should not be published except among students of knowledge. We ask Shaykh Salih to guide us in light of this question?

Answer:
As the questioner mentioned, responses must come from the people of knowledge who are skilled in responding, who know the error, and who are skilled in refuting it with evidence from the Book and the Sunnah. Publishing responses is obligatory; because it is teaching for the Muslims. If he publishes his bid'ah, he publishes his errors to the people, so the correct responses to him must be published in order to remove the harm of the bid'ah and the harm of the errors. This is necessary; this is a cure. If the responses are hidden, evil spreads among the people and bid'ah becomes prevalent. It is necessary to publish the correct responses. We do not say just "responses," but the correct responses issued by the people of knowledge who know the bid'ah, who know the error, and who know how to refute it from the Book and the Sunnah. Yes.