that, it is impermissible for him to cite as evidence anything they relay from Allah, since he deems it possible that they lied in the very matter they attribute to Him. This is unlike the case of a messenger sent by an ordinary human being: such a sender may truly have dispatched him, yet the envoy might speak truthfully about part of what he conveys on his sender’s behalf and falsely about another part.

A human being can indeed send someone who ends up lying about him—either because the sender is unaware of the deception or because he lacks the wisdom to choose a trustworthy emissary. By contrast, the Lord—exalted is He—cannot possibly send a prophet who lies about Him, whether deliberately or by mistake. Likewise, a witness or other informer known to alternate between truth and falsehood may, on occasion, be relied upon for those reports whose truthfulness is confirmed by accompanying indications. The situation of a purported messenger from Allah, however, is different: if he is exposed in even a single lie, it becomes impossible that Allah sent him at all, and everything he claims to transmit from Allah is thereby rendered false. One lie in a single word marks him a liar in all that he conveys from Allah, so that every statement he recounts or narrates on Allah’s behalf is a fabrication—even if, hypothetically, the substance of that statement were true in itself, his delivering, reporting, narrating, and attributing it to Allah would still constitute a lie against Him.