that Allah is the One who created the righteous and good deeds they perform. They therefore see themselves as deserving no praise and as having conferred no favor upon anyone. They recognize that Allah creates the deeds of His servants, so they do not regard anyone as having wronged them, nor do they see themselves as having any claim upon anyone, for they have witnessed that Allah creates everything, including His servants’ deeds and all else. They know that His servants have no claim upon Allah in their own right or by virtue of themselves; rather, He is the One who has prescribed mercy for Himself. They witness that He deserves to be worshipped without anything being associated with Him, and that He deserves to be feared as He ought to be feared. To fear Him as He ought to be feared is to obey Him without disobeying Him, to remember Him without forgetting Him, and to thank Him without being ungrateful to Him. Thus, they see whatever righteous deeds they perform as the fruit of His bounty, grace, and generosity; all praise belongs to Him for that.

They also witness that there is no power or strength except through Allah. As for the harm that others inflict upon them, He created it, and it proceeds from His justice. As for the rights owed to them that people have failed to fulfil, He is the One who did not bring their fulfilment into being. To Him belongs all praise in every circumstance, for what He has done and what He has not done. Their hearts are therefore humbled and broken, because they witness His perfect existence and their own sheer nonexistence. No one is more profoundly humbled than one who sees nothing in himself but nonexistence, who sees nothing as belonging to him and nothing as coming about through him.

The person of spiritual reality, whose rank is below this, shares with him in devoting his religion sincerely to Allah and in doing only what he has been commanded, acting for Allah alone. Yet he falls short of him in witnessing and perceiving Allah’s oneness in lordship, and in witnessing that there is no power or strength except through Allah