upon Him only in the first kind and not in the second, He will still suffice him; yet he will not enjoy the blessed outcome granted to those who rely on Him in matters that He loves and approves.

The loftiest reliance on Allah, therefore, is to rely on Him for guidance, for pure monotheism, for following the Messenger, and for striving against the people of falsehood. This is the reliance characteristic of the Messengers and of the elect among their followers.

Reliance is sometimes a reliance of necessity and compulsion, when the servant can find no refuge or shelter except in it—such as when every apparent means tightens around him, his own soul constricts, and he feels that there is no sanctuary from Allah but toward Him. Relief and ease unfailingly follow this form of reliance.

At other times, reliance is a matter of choice, exercised while the means that lead to the goal are present. If those means are commanded, abandoning them is blameworthy. If one employs the means yet neglects reliance, he is likewise reproached, for reliance is obligatory by consensus of the ummah and by the explicit text of the Qur’an. What is required is to uphold both and combine them.

If the means are forbidden, engaging in them is unlawful, and for such a person reliance becomes his sole means; nothing else remains. Indeed, reliance is among the strongest causes for attaining what is sought and repelling what is disliked—rather, it is the strongest cause altogether.

If the means are merely permissible, then examine whether engaging them weakens your reliance. If it does, scattering your heart and distracting your resolve, then leaving them is preferable. If it does not weaken reliance, then employing them is preferable, for the wisdom of the Wisest of Judges has linked effects to their causes. Do not disable that wisdom so long as you can uphold it—especially when you undertake the means as an act of servitude, thus bringing together the servitude of the heart through reliance and the servitude of the limbs