Manuscript volume 29 · Page 7

I would have known you according to what you would be upon.’ For this reason He said, ﴿Until We know﴾ [Muḥammad 47:31]. Return to yourself and be fair in your speech. When the servant returns to himself and considers the matter as we have mentioned, he knows that the proof has prevailed against him and that God, exalted is He, possesses the proof against him.

Have you not heard Him, exalted is He, say, ﴿God did not wrong them﴾ [al-Naḥl 16:33], ﴿We did not wrong them﴾ [al-Zukhruf 43:76], and say, ﴿But they were wronging themselves﴾ [al-Naḥl 16:33], just as He said, ﴿But they were themselves the wrongdoers﴾ [al-Zukhruf 43:76]—meaning toward themselves?

They did not appear to Us, such that We knew them while they were nonexistent, except in the states in which they appeared in existence.

(Knowledge Following What Is Known)

Knowledge follows what is known^[1]; what is known does not follow knowledge. Understand this. This is an immense, subtle question. To my knowledge no one has drawn attention to it, unless someone did and it did not reach us. No one who realizes it can deny it.

Distinguish, my brother, between a thing's being existent, in which case knowledge precedes its existence, and its being upon these forms in its beginningless state of nonexistence. In the latter it is concurrent with divine knowledge of it, and precedes that knowledge in rank, because through its essence it gave Him knowledge of itself.

Know what we have mentioned, for it will benefit you and strengthen you in submission and delegation concerning the decree and determination that your own state decreed^[2]. Were this question alone contained in this book, it would suffice for every possessor of sound consideration