—upon what answer he will give His Messenger concerning this stance; thereafter he may take sides (1) wherever he pleases. For Allah would never unite the negating disablers and distorters with His own supporters and the supporters of His Messenger and His Book (2) except as a means of trial and testing, just as He brought the messengers and their enemies together in this worldly abode.

I said: A debate very similar to this once occurred between me and one of the scholars of the People of the Book (3). We happened to share a private gathering, and the conversation (4) eventually turned to the outrageous revilement with which the Christians abuse the Lord of the worlds—an abuse the like of which no human being has ever uttered. I told him, “By denying the prophethood of Muhammad—may Allah bless him and grant him peace—you have directed at the Exalted Lord an even greater slander.”

He asked, “And how is that?”

I replied, “Because you claim that Muhammad is a tyrannical king rather than a truthful messenger, that he set out with his sword to subjugate people, deeming their wealth, their women, and their children lawful for himself. Worse still, you accuse him of lying about Allah by saying, ‘Allah commanded me to do this and permitted it for me,’ when Allah neither commanded nor permitted any of it. You allege that he said, ‘Revelation has been sent down to me,’ while nothing was revealed to him at all; that he abrogates the laws of the previous prophets on his own accord—nullifying whatever he wishes, keeping whatever he wishes—and attributes all of that to Allah; that he kills Allah’s friends and the followers of His messengers and enslaves their womenfolk and their offspring. Either Allah, exalted is He, witnessed all of this, knew it, and was fully aware of it, or He was not.

If you say it occurred without His knowledge or awareness [ق 15 أ], you have imputed ignorance to Him.