Convinced that "true" Islam had become disorted at the hand of the ahl al-bida' (the innovators) such as the philosophers, the mutakallimun, the suffis and the Shi'ites, Ibn Taymiyya (d. 1328) not only refutes their fundamental views but also their qur'anic hemeneutics, especially their ta'wil, through which "un-Islamic" views were imposed on the words of the Qur'an. This concern leads him to w…