among people such as these through faulty analogy. When they heard Him describe Himself as the First, the Last, the Manifest, and the Hidden, they drew an analogy and described Him as the Near and the Far. This is mistaken, because those names are all beautiful and indicate the perfection of His encompassing all things in space and time, whereas this combines a beautiful name with its opposite.

The fourth point is that he placed al-Shiblī’s words on belief before those of all the shaykhs who were more eminent and greater than he was. Yet this issue does not deserve precedence; its proper place is later, where he also mentioned it. He should have deferred it to its proper place, for he subsequently discussed the first of the obligations, and that is what deserves precedence. Such an arrangement suggests a measure of personal inclination on the compiler’s part. One of the greatest obligations upon those who follow this path is to be free of such inclinations, for the path rests upon His words:

“But as for him who feared standing before his Lord and restrained himself from desire.”
[Surah al-Nāziʿāt 40]

Then Abū al-Qāsim, may Allah have mercy on him, said: “I heard Abū Hātim say that he had heard Abū Nasr al-Sarrāj, may Allah have mercy on him, say that Ruwaym was asked about the first