and contradictions, and explain that most of what they claim to know about divine matters through their reason is false—although some of their ideas appeared in his own work, and he is said to have retracted them.

There is no doubt that the messengers—may Allah’s blessings be upon them—tell people things that their reason cannot discover, but do not tell them things they know to be impossible. They tell them what perplexes reason, not what reason deems impossible. Whoever seeks to discover through his own reason what the messengers have conveyed resembles those of whom Allah Most High says:

“And when a sign comes to them, they say, ‘We will not believe until we are given the like of what Allah’s messengers were given.’ Allah knows best where to place His message.”

And He says:

“Rather, each one of them desires to be given scrolls laid open.”

[Further Remarks by al-Khattābī and Ibn Taymiyyah’s Commentary]

Al-Khattābī said:

“The scholars adopted a view contrary to this, dividing matters of knowledge into two categories: one whose reality can be apprehended and established, and another whose outward aspect alone is known, without attempting to fathom its inner reality or investigate how it is. In this regard, they went no further than what the Book declares, and His words, glorified is He:

‘And no one knows its interpretation except Allah. Those firmly grounded in knowledge say, “We believe in it.”’

They place