Such a person, then, is loved by the True One. Whoever follows the Messenger is loved by the True One, drawing near to Allah through the obligatory and voluntary acts to which the Messenger called. Clearly, someone like this loves obedience to Allah and His Messenger and hates disobedience to them. All obligatory and voluntary acts of worship are loved by Allah and His Messenger; they contain neither unbelief nor sinful defiance. The Lord Most High loves this person because he does what the True One loves, for a person is recompensed in kind. As he continually draws near to the True One through the voluntary acts He loves, after fulfilling the obligations, the True One loves him, for he has devoted his utmost efforts to what the True One loves. Thus, the True One loves him with a perfect love unattainable by those who draw less near to Him through the things He loves. He comes to know and act through the True One: through Him he hears, through Him he sees, through Him he grasps, and through Him he walks.

As for someone who does not regard a good deed as good or an evil deed as evil, he no longer distinguishes between “two kinds” of things: those loved by the True One and those hated by Him. Rather, he regards everything created as loved by the True One, just as it is willed by Him.

Their fundamental position is that of Jahm ibn Safwān of the Qadariyyah. They are thus among the extreme Jahmī determinists concerning divine decree, even though, concerning the divine attributes, they declare the Jahmiyyah who deny those attributes to be unbelievers. Such is the case with Abū Ismāʿīl al-Ansārī, author of “Manāzil al-Sāʾirīn” (The Stations of the Wayfarers), “Dhamm al-Kalām” (The Censure of Speculative Theology), “al-Fārūq” (The Criterion), “Takfīr al-Jahmiyyah” (Declaring the Jahmiyyah Unbelievers), and other works. In affirming the divine attributes, he stands in the strongest opposition to the Jahmiyyah and those who deny the attributes. Yet concerning actions and divine decree, his position agrees with that of Jahm and his followers among the extreme determinists. This is also the position of al-Ashʿarī and his followers, and of many jurists who follow the four imams, as well as many scholars of hadith and Sufis.