the agents. For someone who performs an act like another person’s is not said to have repeated it, but rather to have imitated or resembled him. By contrast, when someone performs an act a second time like the one he performed initially, he is said to have repeated his act. Likewise, someone who repeats another person’s words is said to have repeated them, whereas someone who composes similar words is not said to have repeated them. One also says, “It was read before this person, and he repeated it before that person,” and, “This person reads—that is, studies—and this person repeats.” Had these been different words merely resembling the original, one would not describe him as repeating them.

Similarly, someone who breaks a ring or another fashioned object is told, “Restore it as it was,” and someone who demolishes a house is told, “Restore it as it was.” By contrast, someone who builds another house like it is not called a restorer. Of the restored thing, one may say, “This is the very same thing as before,” or, “This resembles the original in every respect,” and use similar expressions indicating that it is identical to the original in one respect and like it in another.

This dispels the objections raised concerning this matter, such as the assertion, “Repetition can occur only if that same time is repeated,” and similar claims involving things whose repetition plain reason rules out. Rather, a thing is repeated by bringing forth its like, even though some speculative theologians maintain that there is no difference whatsoever in any respect.

The restoration of which Allah has informed us is restoration in the sense intelligible in this discourse. It is what both the polytheists and the Muslims understood from the Messenger of Allah (may Allah bless him and grant him peace), and it is what the word “restoration” denotes. What is restored is the very same thing as the original. Although there is a difference between what restoration entails and what the initial creation entails, that difference does not preclude