“The answer to a fool is silence.”

In this form it is reported as a saying of al-A‘mash, the great hadith scholar of Kufa (d. 148 AH / 765 CE); Ibn Muflih records it in al-Adab ash-Shar‘iyyah beside al-A‘mash’s shorter “silence is an answer.” The Qur’an describes the same restraint in the servants of the Most Merciful: “when the ignorant address them harshly, they say words of peace” (25:63).