Are the methodologies of Salafism and the Four Imams considered among the 73 sects mentioned in the Hadith: "My Ummah will split into seventy-three sects, all of them in the Fire except one"?

Salafism is not one of the sects into which the Ummah split; rather, it is the adherence to the methodology of the righteous predecessors among the Companions, the Tabi’in, and those who followed them in goodness, whom the Prophet (peace be upon him) and the Qur’an commended. The criterion for affiliation with them is conformity with the Qur’an and Sunnah, not merely the name. Similarly, the jurisprudential schools of thought (Hanafi, Shafi’i, Hanbali, Maliki) are not sects; rather, they are jurisprudential schools that differed in subsidiary matters but agreed on the methodology. The criterion for judging a sect is its conformity or divergence from the methodology of the righteous predecessors in fundamental principles and comprehensive beliefs, not in minor details. For deviation in fundamentals leads to division, as seen in the Khawarij, Murji’ah, Mu’tazilah, and others.