He went on to say:

“We have seen people remain in disbelief for a time and then believe, and others who were believers and then disbelieved. Had this been part of their innate constitution, they would not have changed. But because it was acquired, change and transition were possible. Allah Most High says:

“How would Allah guide a people who disbelieved after having believed?”

He thus truly attributed it to them. He also says:

“That is because they believed, then disbelieved.”

“Why was there no town that believed and benefited from its faith, except the people of Jonah? When they believed…”

Do you not see that their faith benefited them because they had not been created as disbelievers by their very constitution? Yet when Pharaoh said, ‘I believe,’ it did not benefit him.

The Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him, provided a satisfying and convincing answer in the hadith in which he said:

‘Every child is born upon the natural disposition; then his parents make him a Jew, a Christian, or a Magian.’

The Muslims unanimously agree that a disbeliever is not punished and flogged for the way he was created; rather, he is punished and flogged for his intention and what he has acquired through his actions. This is where they prefer what He forbade them over the faith He commanded them to embrace. Thus, His declaring them liars was on account of something they had acquired, a deed they had done, a prohibition they had violated, and a command they had disobeyed. It was something they themselves brought about, not something innate in them, imposed upon them, or ingrained in their nature at creation. For had He created them as disbelievers, they would have been compelled to be so, and no Muslim has maintained this.

Do you not see that when He created them with knowledge, no alternative to it was possible for them or occurred, nor were they rewarded for it? I mean knowledge of His lordship, which is the natural disposition. Yet we find that it is possible to move from disbelief to