of its outward meaning and in astonishment at its inner meaning—all to preserve the rules you devised through your own faculties and systematized according to principles that have kept you away from your Lord. Beware of asserting Allah’s transcendence in ways contrary to those of the earlier scholars, and guard against equating Him with His creation or likening Him to it. By my life, this is the straight path, sharper than a sword and finer than a hair. Whoever Allah does not grant light has no light.

As for the qualities in which they differ in excellence, these include everlasting life and eternal existence in the Hereafter; an angel has no more than this. Although this life of ours is marred by death, I have already explained that the comparison is made only after both natures have attained perfection, when nothing remains but enduring existence. Other such qualities include the knowledge that distinguishes the angels.

To this we say: There is no denying that each kind possesses knowledge that the other does not, for revelation reaches the messengers in various ways, as Allah Most High says:

“It is not for a human being that Allah should speak to him except through revelation, or from behind a veil, or by sending a messenger to reveal, by His permission, whatever He wills.”

He thus explains that He speaks to human beings in three ways: one involves an angel as intermediary, while in the other two the angel conveys no revelation. What part did the angel have in the night of the Ascension, the day at the Mount, the teaching of the names, and so much else? Even if it were established that human knowledge in this world comes only through the angels—which, by Allah, is false—what would they make of the Day of Resurrection, when the Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him, has said: