revelation, some can be known only through revelation, and others can be known through revelation in some cases and through reason in others.”

He said:

“As for the first category, anything whose truth must be known before the validity of revelation can be known cannot itself be established through revelation. Examples include knowing that the Creator exists, that He acts by choice and knows all that can be known, and that the messengers are truthful.”

He said:

“As for the second category, it concerns one of the two alternatives for a contingent thing obtaining rather than the other, when a person neither finds it within himself nor perceives it through any of his senses. For if it is entirely possible for a crow to be present or absent on the summit of Mount Qāf, with nothing whatsoever necessitating either alternative, and this lies beyond inward awareness and sensory perception, then its presence cannot be known except through the statement of a truthful speaker.

“As for the third category, it consists in knowing the necessity of what is necessary, the possibility of what is possible, and the impossibility of what is impossible, where knowing the validity of revelation does not depend on knowing their necessity, possibility, or impossibility. Examples include the question of seeing Allah, the divine attributes, divine oneness, and others.”