commentator that this chapter is the most distinguished part of this book, for he has arranged the sciences of the Sufis in a manner in which none before him preceded him, and none after him has equalled him.”

This represents the highest knowledge of Sufism that these people possess. Yet anyone who understands what Allah sent His Messenger with, and the way followed by the Sufi masters who believe in Allah and His Messenger and adhere to the Quran and Sunnah, will see upon reflection that fully realizing what he sets forth in this book does not make a man a Muslim, let alone a friend of Allah. The friends of Allah are the believers who are mindful of Him.

The furthest he reaches is the annihilation in divine oneness that he describes. This is the conception of divine oneness held by the extreme Jahmiyyah: it entails denying the divine attributes, while affirming that the celestial spheres have existed eternally, that the Lord acts by the necessity of His essence rather than by His will, and that He does not know particulars.

Even supposing that this were annihilation in the oneness of Allah’s lordship, including acknowledgment of the names and attributes with which Allah sent His Messenger, this affirmation of oneness alone would not make a man a Muslim, let alone a gnostic and a friend of Allah. For the polytheists who worship idols acknowledge this oneness: they acknowledge that Allah is the Creator, Lord, and Sovereign of everything.

It is only the Sufis among these heretics—such as Ibn Tufayl, the author of the treatise Hayy ibn Yaqzān, and others like him—who make annihilation in this conception of divine oneness the ultimate attainment of the gnostics. Hence they take encouragement from whatever they find in Abū Hāmid’s words