If no sound reconciliation is available, the chronology needed for abrogation is not established, and the relevant grounds for preference remain inconclusive, the scholar may adopt tawaqquf—suspension of judgment. This does not declare both reports false or erased; it withholds a conclusion about the specific unresolved opposition.
«وَالتَّعْبِيرُ بِالتَّوَقُّفِ أَوْلَى مِنَ التَّعْبِيرِ بِالتَّسَاقُطِ»
Describing the outcome as suspension is preferable to calling both proofs discarded.
Further evidence about a chain, context, date, or external corroboration may later resolve the issue. The scholarly virtue is not claiming certainty where the evidence does not support it.