Ancestors and descendants, looking at each other over the centuries, will form a Council of Consultation amongst each other. However, the first group - the old fathers - will listen silently and praisefully..." (The Debates-Munazarat, 73)

"Obstinacy and partisanship are extremely harmful in social life.

If it is said : "There is a Hadith which says: "Difference among my people is an instance of Divine Mercy", and difference requires partisanship.

The sickness of partisanship also delivers the oppressed common people from the oppressor elite, for if the elite of a town or village join together, they will destroy the oppressed common people. If there is partisanship, the oppressed may seek refuge with one of the parties and thus save himself.

It is also from the confrontation of opinions and the contradiction of views that truth becomes apparent in its full measure."

The Answer:

To the first part of the question, we say: The difference intended in the Hadith is a positive difference. That is, each party strives to promote and diffuse its own belief; it does not seek to tear down and destroy that of the other, but rather to improve and reform it. Negative difference is rejected by the Hadith, for it aims in partisan and hostile fashion at mutual destruction, and those who are at each other’s throats cannot act positively.