and the words of al-Khidr:

“So I intended to damage it.”

“So we intended that their Lord should replace him for them with one better in purity and closer in affection.”

“So your Lord intended that they should reach maturity.”

The true nature of these matters has been discussed at length, and it has been explained that Allah has created nothing without a wise purpose. The Most High says:

“Who perfected everything He created.”

And He says:

“The work of Allah, who has perfected all things.”

Thus, a created thing is good and reflects wisdom when considered in relation to the wise purpose for which it was created. Even if it involves evil in another respect, that evil is incidental and limited in scope; it is not pure evil. Rather, evil intended to bring about a greater good is good on the part of the wise agent, even though it is evil for the one affected by it.

Anyone who supposes that the intended wise purpose could be fully realized without that evil does so only because he lacks knowledge of the true nature of things and their interconnectedness. For when the Creator creates something, He must also create what its existence necessarily entails: a thing cannot exist without its necessary concomitants. He must also refrain from creating its incompatible opposites, for two mutually exclusive opposites cannot coexist at the same time.

He—glorified be He—has power over all things; nothing is excluded from this universal statement. However, the term “thing” denotes that whose existence is conceivable. What is intrinsically impossible is not a thing, as all people of reason agree.