grasp from them something that is the very opposite of their actual subject-matter (1) and true purport—by a wide margin. The Qur’an’s ease and clarity (2) therefore stand in stark contradiction to the method of the negators and distorters. When they found it difficult to extract negation from its verses, and that difficulty proved insurmountable (3), they resorted to imaginary specious arguments (4) which they grandly labeled “decisive rational proofs” and “certain principles” (5). Yet whoever’s heart Allah has illumined and whose inner sight has been anointed with the kohl of faith will see those proofs as nothing but “the scrawny flesh of a camel on the summit of a rugged mountain: too steep to climb, too lean to bother carrying away” (6). They belong to the same class as the hallucinations of the chronically ill (7) and the ravings of the deranged, and with them they have blackened both hearts and pages.

Their method is the exact antithesis of the Qur’an’s in every respect: the Qur’an offers truth in the finest exposition and clearest diction, whereas they peddle false notions in the most convoluted, prolix, and unintelligible language. Thus the thirsty seeker (8) strains himself following in their wake until his strength is spent, only to find that he has reached a mirage on a barren plain: “The thirsty one thinks it is water, but when he comes to it he finds nothing there, yet he finds Allah present, and He will repay him in full; Allah is swift in reckoning (38) —or like layers of darkness in a deep sea—”