either explicitly or by analogy. As for those who offer allusive interpretations while affirming what the wording indicates, and understand the alluded meaning through analogy and reflection, their approach is like that of jurists versed in analogy and reflection. This is sound when the analogy is valid rather than invalid, and the reflection sound rather than distorted.

Since our purpose here is to discuss the interpretation of the verse, we say:

The interpretation transmitted from those among the early generations and Quran commentators who gave it—namely, that everything will perish except that by which His Face is sought—is better than that newly introduced interpretation. Indeed, interpreting the verse according to that newly introduced interpretation is impermissible. This can be demonstrated in several ways: some establish the superiority of the former interpretation, while others establish the invalidity of the latter.

First:

He did not say, “Everything will perish except insofar as it is from Him,” or “except insofar as it is from His Face.” Rather, He said, “except His Face.” This entails that there are things that perish, with His Face excepted.

If “His Face” is taken to mean His existence, this entails that everything other than His existence perishes, and thus that created beings perish. Yet this is not the case. The same objection also applies to the view of the proponents of the unity of existence: according to them, there is only one existence. It therefore cannot correctly be said, “Everything other than His existence perishes,” since there is nothing that can be described as other than His existence. The foundation of their doctrine is the denial that, in reality, anything else or anything other exists.

This is completed by the second point:

If it is said that “perishing” means a contingent being that has no existence from itself, then the meaning would be: “Nothing has its existence from itself except Him.”

The response is that using the word “perishing” for an existing created thing merely because its existence comes from its Lord rather than from itself is unknown in the language, whether literally or figuratively.