and water, wine, silk, gold, and silver, he could not conceive of what he has been told of such things in the unseen.

Yet this does not mean that the unseen must be like the visible world. Ibn ‘Abbās, may Allah be pleased with him, said, “Nothing of what is in Paradise exists in this world except its names.” The realities we have been told exist in Paradise are not identical to the things in this world, such that the same things would be possible, necessary, or impossible for both, their substance would be the same, and they would undergo the same transformations. We know that the water of Paradise neither spoils nor becomes stagnant, its milk does not change in taste, and its wine neither gives its drinker a headache nor deprives him of his reason. Its water does not spring from the earth or descend from clouds like water in this world, nor is its milk produced from livestock as it is in this world; and likewise with other such things.

Thus, one created thing shares a name with another, and they have a common measure of meaning and resemblance through which we understand what we are being told, even though their actual realities are not alike. The Creator—exalted is His Majesty—is far further removed from resembling His creatures than the things in Paradise are from resembling those in this world. When He describes Himself as Living, All-Knowing, All-Hearing, All-Seeing, and All-Powerful, this does not entail that He resembles His creation, for the disparity between Him and His creation is greater than the disparity between any created beings. Every small animal has life, strength, and activity, yet these animals do not resemble the created angels. How, then, could the Lord of all worlds resemble any created being?

Allah, glorified and exalted is He, has given Himself and His attributes names that He has also applied to some created beings. Thus, He has called Himself Living, All-Knowing, All-Hearing, All-Seeing, Almighty, the Compeller, Supreme in Majesty,