and he rejects every specific incident related about numerous individuals, arguing that, since they are not saints in his estimation, the report must be false. At the opposite extreme are those who assume that anyone displaying the least breach of normal causation is automatically a friend of Allah—and both positions are erroneous.

Hence you will hear such people claim that the idolaters and the People of the Scripture have protectors who aid them in fighting the Muslims and that those protectors are allies of Allah. Others reply by denying that the idolaters and People of the Scripture possess any miraculous help at all. The sound view, however, is a third position: they do indeed have helpers of their own kind, but those helpers are not friends of Allah, exalted is He. Allah the Most High says:

“O believers, do not take the Jews and the Christians as allies; they are allies of one another. Whoever of you takes them as allies is surely one of them” (Qur’an 5:51).

As for the worshipers and ascetics who are not among Allah’s pious friends—those who faithfully follow the Book and the sunnah—devils attach themselves to them. Each may display marvels suited to his state, yet the feats of these people cancel one another out, and whenever someone endowed with true spiritual authority from among the friends of Allah appears, he nullifies their pretensions. Inevitably, each of them harbors some falsehood, whether through ignorance or deliberate intent, and commits sins proportionate to the devils that cling to him. In this way Allah differentiates His righteous allies from those who merely resemble them, the allies of the devils.

Allah, the Exalted, says:

“Shall I inform you upon whom the devils descend? They descend upon every lying, sinful person” (Qur’an 26:221–222).

Al-afāk means “the liar,” and al-athīm means “the profligate.”