Imam Sadiq (peace be upon him): A man said to Imam Sadiq (peace be upon him): "If the Jewish people know of the Torah only what they hear from their scholars, then no path remains for them except [following] them; so how has Allah reproached them for imitating and accepting from their scholars? And is it not the case that the common folk of the Jews, just like our common folk, imitate their own scholars? And if the following and imitation by their common folk of their scholars is not permitted for them, then the ruling for the imitation of our common folk of our scholars must be the same." The Imam (peace be upon him) said: "Between our common folk and our scholars, and between the common folk of the Jews and their scholars, there is a difference from one aspect and equality from another. As for the aspect in which they are equal: Allah has reproached our common folk for [blindly] imitating their scholars just as He reproached the common folk and scholars of the Jews. And as for the aspect in which they differ, [our common folk] are not reproached [in that regard]." The man said: "O son of the Messenger of Allah! Explain this matter to me more clearly." The Imam (peace be upon him) said: "The common folk of the Jews knew fully well the corruption of their scholars — outright lying, consuming what is unlawful, taking bribes, altering and changing Allah's rulings, and using influence [and favouritism] — and they knew them for their misplaced bigotry: a bigotry that separated them from the truth and caused them to trample the religion of Allah and the rights of the oppressed, and to give unjustly the wealth of others to those for whom they were partisan. The common folk of the Jews knew well that their scholars clung to forbidden things and were certain, by religious standards, that whoever behaves in this manner is undoubtedly a transgressor (fasiq) and is not fit to be an intermediary between creation and the Creator, nor to represent the divine religion. Allah reproached the common folk of the Jews for this very reason, because with awareness and open eyes they threw themselves into the snare of transgressor scholars, and imitated those whom they understood should not be imitated, whose verdicts and reports should not be accepted, and whose statements — conveyed on behalf of a prophet (Musa (peace be upon him)) whom they had not seen — should not be trusted. They knew that in such a situation they were obliged to examine the rulings of the religion themselves and come to know their prophet's message, because the proofs and signs of the religion of the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him and his family) were too clear to remain hidden and too well known not to become manifest to them. The same criterion applies to the common folk of our community: when they recognise in their scholars evident transgression, extreme bigotry, [like hungry dogs] barking at one another over the rulers and forbidden things of the world, the destruction of anyone with whom they are hostile or against whom they are bigoted — even if that person deserves that his affair be set right — and the doting kindness and favour towards anyone for whom they are partisan — even if that person deserves humiliation and disgrace — then in such circumstances, whichever of our common folk imitates such jurists will be exactly like the Jew who, through imitating his transgressor jurists, fell under Allah's reproach. So any jurist who guards his own soul, preserves his religion, opposes his own desires, and obeys the command of his Master — it is [incumbent] upon the common folk to imitate him. And these conditions apply only to some of the Shia jurists, not all of them. But any scholar who commits vile acts and sins like the transgressor jurists of the general public — do not accept from them what they report from us, and give them no honour! The reason for the abundance of the mixing of authentic and fabricated hadiths reported from us the Ahl al-Bayt (peace be upon them) is precisely this: the transgressors listen to our words and, out of ignorance, distort all of it, and because of the paucity of their knowledge they place matters in a wrong context. And another group deliberately lies against us in order to obtain some paltry worldly gain — a thing that drags them to Hellfire. And among them is a group (from the enemies of the faith) who are cunning; they are unable to find fault with our speech, so [they] learn some of our authentic sciences and convey them to our Shia, and criticise us in front of our enemies, then add many times over that amount of lies and falsehoods to our speech — from all of which we are free and innocent. But [unfortunately] our Shia accept these, believing them to be from our knowledge and sciences. Thus they go astray and lead others astray. The harm and damage of these people upon our weak Shia is greater than that of Yazid's army upon Husayn ibn Ali (peace be upon him) and his companions, for they plunder both souls and wealth. And this group of evil-doing scholars are the enemies of the religion, who outwardly count themselves among our lovers and obedient followers and enemies of our enemies, and who introduce doubt and confusion upon our weak Shia, leading them astray and preventing them from reaching the true destination. Yet Allah the Exalted knows, from the heart of any of these common folk, whoever intends nothing but to preserve his religion and to honour his guardian; [Allah] never abandons such a person in the hands of these outward-deceiving disbelievers, but raises up for him a believer who will guide him to the correct path, and in this way Allah grants them (the common folk with sincere intent) the success to accept the speech of that believer. By this Allah gathers for him the good of this world and the Hereafter, and gathers upon the one who led him astray the curse of this world and the punishment of the Hereafter." Then he said: The Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him and his family) has said: "The worst of the scholars of my community are those who lead [the misguided] astray from [the path of] us; the highwaymen who cut off the paths leading to us; those who give the [ranks and] names of us to our opponents and confer our titles upon our rivals; upon such they send blessings, though [they] are more deserving of curses, and they curse us, while we are immersed and drowned in the honours of Allah, and, through the blessings of Allah and the blessings of His nearest angels upon us, we are independent and in no need of their blessings upon us."