something Allah loves more, or involves something He hates more than He loves that act of pardon, the weightier consideration takes precedence.

Thus, a thing’s being beautiful is a reason for Allah to love it. He, glorified be He, has made everything He created good, for everything that exists necessarily embodies some aspect of the wisdom for which Allah created it. From that perspective, it is good and beloved—even if, from another perspective, it entails something Allah loves and is pleased with to a degree greater than His hatred of what is in the thing itself.

We find this among ourselves. A person may do something, such as drinking an unpleasant medicine, which he hates more than he likes. Yet because it brings about something he loves more than he hates the medicine, he wills it, chooses it, and does it. Thus, with a firm will accompanied by the ability to act, he wills an action containing more of what he hates than of what he loves, because it necessarily wards off something he hates still more and brings about something he loves more than he hates this action. His hatred of illness and his love of good health are greater than his hatred of the medicine.

Accordingly, the beings we hate, such as devils and disbelievers, and likewise the acts we hate, such as disbelief, wickedness, and disobedience, were created by Him, and He willed their existence because of the wisdom they entail, which He loves, and because their existence wards off what He hates still more. Thus, He wills them while also hating them and being displeased with them, as we have explained elsewhere.

As for beauty in the particular sense, He, glorified be He, is beautiful and loves beauty. And the beauty that