from the First Principle (1) to the Active Intellect, and that it then overflowed from that Intellect onto the noble, receptive rational soul—they would not have been able to comprehend it. Nor would they have grasped the true nature of the spiritual hereafter had the messengers described it as it really is. Accordingly, the messengers brought the intelligible realities nearer by casting them in perceptible forms. They coined parables of bodies rising from their graves on the Day of Presentation and Resurrection, and of those bodies proceeding either to a Garden in which there is eating, drinking, meat, wine, and beautiful maidens, or to a Fire containing diverse kinds of torment—thereby conveying spiritual delight through that image, and spiritual pain through that image (2).

They proceeded likewise with regard to the existence of the Lord, His attributes, and His acts. They offered the likeness of an exceedingly magnificent Being (3)—greater than every existing thing—who possesses a tremendous throne and is established above His throne; who hears, sees, and speaks; who commands and forbids; who is pleased and angered; who comes, approaches, and descends; who has two hands and a face; who acts by His will and choice. When the servants speak, He hears their speech (4); when they move, He sees their movements; when a thought crosses the heart of any one of them, He knows it. Indeed, He descends to them every night (5) to this lowest heaven and says, “Who is there who prays to Me so that I may grant him? Who (6) seeks My forgiveness so that I may forgive him?” (7) —and so forth, as is stated in the divine scriptures.