impossible. Rather, they convey to us things that reason can accommodate, not things that reason regards as impossible. It is inconceivable that anything reported by the Messenger should contradict plain reason, and it is likewise inconceivable for two conclusive proofs to be at odds—whether both are rational, both transmitted, or one rational and the other transmitted. What, then, of someone who claims an unveiling that flatly contradicts both revelation and sound reason?!

These individuals are not always deliberately lying; instead, images are projected into their minds and they imagine them to exist outside themselves. At other times they witness phenomena that do occur externally, but assume them to be karāmāt (wondrous signs) granted to the righteous, whereas they are in fact deceptions of the devils.

Preferring the saints to the prophets and claiming that prophethood has not ceased

Those who champion this doctrine of “oneness” may even place the saints above the prophets and assert that prophethood has never come to an end.

Their view of sin

As is reported from Ibn Sabʿīn and others, they divide the stations into three: they say that at first the servant beholds both obedience and sin; then he beholds obedience without sin; and finally he beholds neither obedience nor sin. The first vision is the sound one, for it distinguishes between acts of obedience and acts of disobedience. By the second vision they mean witnessing the divine decree (qadar).

One of them even declares, “I disbelieve in a Lord who is disobeyed,” maintaining that sin is nothing more than opposing the divine will—which is the divine volition—and that all creation is encompassed by that volition. Their poet says: