those recorded against the person experiencing them and those forgiven. They are comparable to the states experienced by people other than worshippers and ascetics: sanity and sobriety, fainting, intoxication and insanity, compulsion and free choice. The states of kings and rulers, guides and scholars, and shaykhs and the spiritual poor all fall under this noble principle, and Islamic law judges them by distinguishing between them.

If to this is added the fact that disclosures of knowledge or effects brought about under divine decree by those experiencing such states do not necessarily entail friendship with Allah—not even righteousness, nor indeed faith, since such things may occur in an unbeliever, a hypocrite, an evildoer or a sinner—and that the friends of Allah, who shall have no fear nor grieve, are only those who believe and are mindful of Him, then a distinction is drawn between friendship with Allah and these states, just as a distinction is drawn between the prophetic caliphate and kingship in general, and between the knowledge that is the prophets’ legacy and discourse in general.

These two categories overlap without coinciding. A man may be a friend of Allah who experiences a state involving extraordinary effects and disclosure, or he may be a friend of Allah without possessing that state in its fullness. Conversely, he may possess something of these states without being a friend of Allah. Likewise, a man may be a prophet’s successor who commands obedience, or a prophet’s successor who is weak and oppressed; or he may be a tyrant who commands obedience yet has no connection whatsoever with prophethood. A man may also be a scholar who does not engage in discourse contrary to the words of the prophets, or a scholar whose discourse consists of the words of the prophets.