Another example is his prohibition, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, against saying after a missed opportunity, “If only I had done such-and-such.” He said, “It opens the door to Satan’s work,” and directed the person to say something more beneficial instead: “Allah has decreed, and He does whatever He wills” (1).

For saying, “If I had (2) done such-and-such, I would not have missed what I missed, or fallen into what I fell into,” brings him no benefit whatsoever. He cannot recover what has already passed in his affairs (3), nor can he undo his stumble by saying “if” (4). Implicit in this “if” is the claim that, had matters unfolded as he imagined, the outcome would have differed from what Allah ordained, decreed, and willed. Yet the event he wishes had turned out otherwise occurred only (5) by Allah’s ordainment, decree, and will. Thus, when he says, “Had I done such-and-such, the outcome would have been different,” he is asserting an impossibility, since an outcome contrary to what has been decreed and ordained is impossible. His words therefore contain falsehood, ignorance, and an impossibility. Even if they do not amount to denying divine decree, they still oppose it when he says, “Had I acted, I would have averted what was decreed for me.”

If it is objected: This neither rejects divine decree (6) nor denies (7) it, since the means he wishes he had employed are also part of divine decree. He is therefore saying, “Had I been enabled (8) to attain this decree, it would have warded off from me