Wisdom and right conduct consist in doing what ought to be done in the manner in which it ought to be done.

Extravagance and wastefulness consist in exceeding due bounds in spending. Their opposite, parsimony and miserliness, consists in falling short of obligatory expenditure.

What is right is a comprehensive term for everything whose goodness and benefit are recognized by divine law and reason; wrongdoing is its opposite.

Uprightness means constantly adhering to obedience to Allah and His Messenger.

Disease of the heart means its being unsound. It is of two kinds: a disease of doubts concerning the truth and a disease of desire for forbidden things.

Hypocrisy consists in outwardly displaying good while inwardly concealing evil. It therefore includes hypocrisy in belief and hypocrisy in conduct.

The Quran is wholly perfected: its verses have been made perfect in that they accord with wisdom, its reports are of the utmost truthfulness, and its rulings are supremely excellent. The whole of it is also mutually harmonious, in that its parts are alike in eloquence and beauty, confirm one another, and agree perfectly.

Some of it is decisive and some ambiguous. Its ambiguous passages are those containing generality or allowing certain possible meanings, while its decisive passages are clear, explanatory, and explicit in meaning. When the ambiguous is referred back to the decisive, all of it agrees and its meanings become coherent.

Allah’s being with His servants, as mentioned in His Book, is of two kinds:

One is the general sense, namely His knowledge and all-encompassing awareness: He is with His servants wherever they may be.

The other is a special sense: He is with the elect of His creation by granting them victory, gracious care, and support.

Supplication and invocation encompass the supplication of worship, which includes every act of worship commanded by Allah and His Messenger.

They also encompass petitionary supplication, which is asking Allah to bring benefits and avert harms.

Good and wholesome things is a comprehensive term for everything wholesome and beneficial, including beliefs, character traits, deeds, foods, drinks, and earnings. Vile things are their opposite.

The vile may also mean that which is inferior, while the wholesome means that which is choice, as Allah Most High says, “O you who believe, spend from the good things you have earned and from what We have brought forth from the earth for you” (1)

Spending includes obligatory expenditure, such as zakat, expiation, and maintenance of oneself, one’s family, and one’s slaves. It also includes recommended expenditure, such as spending in every avenue of good.

Allah has commanded reliance upon Him and seeking His aid, and He has praised those who rely upon Him in many verses.

The reality of this is the heart’s firm reliance upon Allah to secure benefits and avert harms, both religious and worldly, while trusting Him to bring this about.

The intellect that Allah commends and whose possessors He praises—stating that they are the ones who benefit from the signs—is that which understands and grasps beneficial realities, acts upon them, and restrains its possessor from harmful things. It is therefore also called hijr (restraint), lubb (understanding), and nuhā (discernment), because it restrains its possessor and prevents him from what would harm him.

Knowledge is recognizing guidance by means of its proof. It comprises knowing the beneficial matters one seeks, together with their evidences and the paths leading to them.

Beneficial knowledge is knowledge of the truth and acting upon it; its opposite is ignorance.

The term ummah has four senses in the Quran: it can mean “a group of people,” which is its predominant usage; and it can mean “a period of time,”