their own experience that they were not impelled by this belief, which entails likening Allah to human beings and regarding Him as being of their kind. To allege this of them is to fabricate a lie against them.

The twenty-ninth point: These people constantly hear mention of angels and jinn, who are living and possess knowledge and power. Yet they know that they take human form, as Gabriel appeared to Mary as a man in perfect form, and as Iblīs appeared in the form of Surāqa ibn Ju‘shum. Nevertheless, when they were told that Gabriel, peace be upon him, had six hundred