that is complete, for him to attain it by a long route leading in the opposite direction.

Thus, when servants are in distress, supplicate to Allah Most High, and direct their intention fully towards Him, they cannot turn towards Him except directly. They therefore turn upwards rather than in any other direction, for this is the straight, near path. Every other route entails distance, deviation, and length. With the complete intention characteristic of the worshipper who supplicates and the distressed person who pleads, it is impossible to turn towards Him except upwards. It is impossible to turn towards Him in another direction, just as it is impossible to lower a rope that descends upon Him. The two cases are alike, and Allah knows best.

As for revealed law, the messengers, may Allah bless them, were sent to perfect and affirm the innate disposition, not to replace or alter it. The Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, said in the hadith recorded by both al-Bukhārī and Muslim:

“Every child is born upon the innate disposition. Then his parents make him a Jew, a Christian, or a Magian, just as an animal gives birth to a whole animal: do you see any mutilation in it?”

Allah Most High says:

“So direct your face towards the religion, inclining to truth. Adhere to the natural disposition upon which Allah created mankind. There is no altering Allah’s creation. That is the upright religion, but most people do not know.” [al-Rūm: 30]

Thus, in worship and supplication, revealed law prescribed what accords with the innate disposition. This contrasts with the ways of the misguided among the polytheists, the philosophizing Sabians, and others. They altered the innate disposition in both knowledge and will, and contradicted both reason and revelation, as we have explained at length elsewhere.

It is established in the two Sahīh collections through several chains of transmission that the Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, said:

“When one of you stands to pray, he must not spit in front of him, for Allah is before him, nor to his right, for there is an angel to his right. Rather, he may spit to his left or beneath his foot.”

Another narration states:

“He permitted spitting into one’s garment.”