the attributes of His smallest creature, so tiny that you can scarcely see it. It moves about and comes and goes, yet neither its hearing nor its sight can be seen. The workings of its intelligence, by which it acts and devises, are harder for you to grasp and more hidden from you than what is apparent of its hearing and sight. Blessed, then, is Allah, the best of creators and their Creator, the Master of all masters and their Lord:
“There is nothing like Him, and He is the All-Hearing, the All-Seeing.”
Recognize—may Allah have mercy on you—that your inability to know the full extent of the attributes the Lord has described frees you from straining to describe what He has not described of Himself. If you do not know the full extent of what He has described, why burden yourself with seeking knowledge of what He has not described? Would such knowledge guide you to any act of obedience to Him, or deter you from any act of disobedience to Him?
As for the one who denies what the Lord has described of Himself through excessive probing and strained speculation, “the devils have lured him astray on earth, bewildered.” He then begins adducing what he claims are proofs for denying the attributes the Lord has described and named for Himself, saying: “If He has such-and-such, He must necessarily have such-and-such.” Thus, what is hidden blinds him to what is clear. He denies what the Lord has named for Himself because the Lord has remained silent about attributes He has not named. Satan continues to lead him on until he denies the words of Allah, Mighty and Majestic:
“On that Day faces will be radiant, looking at their Lord.”
He says: “No one will see Him on the Day of Resurrection.” By Allah, he has thereby denied the greatest honor Allah bestows upon His friends on the Day of Resurrection: looking upon His face, and His making them radiant, “in a seat of honor with an All-Powerful Sovereign.” He has decreed that they will not die, and they grow radiant through looking upon Him.”
He went on to say:
“He denied seeing Allah on the Day of Resurrection only to uphold a misguided and misleading argument, for he