What is the ruling on declaring the sects that have deviated from the correct creed, such as the Asha'irah and the Maturidiyyah, to be disbelievers?

The Shaykh : In this matter, it is one of the issues in which some people, whether in the past or the present, contradict the texts of the Book and the Sunnah and the Salaf al-Salih (the earliest generations). We believe in this matter and in others that it is not permissible to rush into declaring someone a disbeliever, which means expelling him from the religion and imposing upon him the rulings that follow from the judgment of apostasy. I believe that issuing this judgment is not permissible except after establishing the proof. This is because we all know, if Allah wills, that there are many sects that have contradicted the guidance of the Salaf in this matter and in others, yet the practice of the Muslims, including the people of the Sunnah and the Salaf al-Salih, has been to not treat them as apostates from their religion. Rather, they initially, or at the beginning of the matter, were content with applying the term "misguidance" to such people. As for rushing to declare them disbelievers, this does not happen except, as I mentioned earlier, after establishing the proof by those who are qualified to do so, namely the scholars. This is because we see in this time that many of our brothers among the students of knowledge imagine that they have become those qualified to establish proof and clarify matters simply because they have mastered some issues. They say, "We have established the proof against so-and-so, and we have established the proof against so-and-so," and then they follow this up by applying the term "disbelief" to them. We know from the biography of our imams, the people of hadith and the Sunnah, that many of the narrators of hadith were deviant in a little or a lot of the Salafi creed, and yet they narrated from them. They only narrated from them because, in the judgment of these imams, they were still within the circle of Islam, even if, as I said earlier, they judged them to be misguided. Perhaps many of those present now know this. It is regrettable to us all that the most widespread schools of thought, even today, regarding creed and what they call the science of theology, are the Maturidiyyah and the Asha'irah. Also, we know that some of the early imams and those who followed them from these sects, or these two sects, the Asha'irah and the Maturidiyyah, some of their imams adopted such creeds, and yet they were not expelled from the circle of the religion. We know, for example, that Abu al-Hasan al-Ash'ari (may Allah have mercy on him) adopted the school of the Mu'tazilah for a long period and many years, and yet, by explicit text, our imams did not judge this person, let alone the Mu'tazilah in general, to be disbelievers or apostates. Rather, they were content with judging their misguidance and deviation from the correct creed. Then Allah (Mighty and Majestic) guided whom He willed of those Mu'tazilah to the path of the correct Sunnah, and at the head of the list of these was Abu al-Hasan al-Ash'ari. His well-known book is the clearest example that he became upright after that long deviation. But, unfortunately, his followers continued on the school of Abu al-Hasan al-Ash'ari in many of his old issues, such as Imam al-Haramayn and others like him, who admitted that they adopted the statement, even if they did not explicitly state or clarify that the speech of Allah (Mighty and Majestic) is created, because they interpreted the divine speech as the mental speech. And yet, all Muslims consider these people to be among the scholars of the Muslims, not just among the Muslims. Then, Allah (Mighty and Majestic) guided whom He willed of them, and they explicitly stated that they had been deviant from the straight path and the correct Sunnah. This imam and others mentioned that the reason for that was their good opinion of the imams they were following. From here, we say that one should not rush to declare those who have been afflicted with taqlid (following a scholar without knowing his evidence) to be misguided, let alone disbelievers, whether this taqlid is in creeds or in rulings. As we mentioned recently and in the past, many of the lands of the non-Arabs have not heard the call of the Sunnah to this day, and they are living on what they found their fathers and grandfathers upon. The proof is established against them only when it becomes possible for some scholars to convey the correct call to them, and for them to be in a position of strength in knowledge, establishing the proof, and also making them understand in their language that they understand. And unfortunately, this is very little in every time and in every place. Therefore, I say briefly what I clarified earlier: it is not correct to rush and hasten to declare every scholar whose deviation from some Salafi ideas or creeds has reached us to be a disbeliever.