The recantation of Abu'l-Wafa' Ibn 'Aqil

On Wednesday, 10 Muharram 465 AH, Abu al-Wafa Ali ibn Aqil, the most learned Hanbali of his age, attended the diwan with a group of Hanbalis. They reached a reconciliation, and Ibn Aqil wrote out a copy of his repentance in his own hand. ¹

The repentance reads: "Ali ibn Aqil says: I disavow myself before God Most High from the doctrines of the innovators and of the Mu'tazila and others, from keeping company with their leaders, from honouring their imams, and from showing mercy to their predecessors. Whatever I wrote down that carries their doctrines and errors, and whatever was found in my hand, I repent to God Most High for having written it. It is not lawful to write it, to read it, or to hold it as belief." He acknowledged that he had believed of al-Hallaj that he was a man of religion, asceticism and miracles, and had stated this in a treatise he composed: "I repent to God Most High of that. He was killed by the consensus of the jurists of his age, and they were right in that, and he was wrong." Many witnesses attested to this, and he went to the house of al-Sharif Abu Ja'far and made peace with him. ¹