for the benefit of the public. In reality, these people deny the truthfulness of the messengers. Our discussion with them therefore concerns establishing prophethood as it truly is, not a conflict between reason and revelation.

What I have described is expressly stated by their leading thinkers. They say:

“The public benefit from the messengers’ reports only through imaginative representations. Neither the public nor the elite benefit from their reports in acquiring knowledge of the unseen. Rather, in their view, the elite know these matters through reason, in contradiction to the prophets’ reports, while the public know them neither through reason nor through reports. The sole benefit of prophethood is to present what the prophets report to the public through imaginative representations.”

Al-Fārābī, Ibn Sīnā, and their followers expressly state this.

A person either accepts the reports conveyed by the prophets as prophets or does not. If he does not, we do not discuss with him a conflict between rational and scriptural proof. Such a conflict can only arise after acknowledging that each proof would be valid if it were free of countervailing evidence. Whoever does not acknowledge the validity of any rational proof whatsoever is not addressed concerning a conflict between rational and scriptural proof. Likewise, whoever does not acknowledge scriptural proof is not addressed concerning this conflict.

Whoever does not acknowledge the prophets derives no scriptural proof from their reports. The discussion with such a person concerns establishing the prophets’ prophethood. Once that is established, scriptural proof is established; at that point, one must acknowledge that the reports of