Gray hair is hateful, yet hateful too to part with it;
Marvel at something loved despite being despised.

A person dislikes and hates gray hair because it entails the passing of beneficial youth and the onset of harmful aging. Yet he also loves it and dislikes its absence, because its presence means continued life, whereas its absence means death.

This is the case with everything that combines benefit and harm. On closer examination, however, a particular act—such as prayer in a particular house—cannot itself be both commanded and prohibited, since that would impose an impossible obligation: it would require the person acting to combine the occurrence and nonoccurrence of that particular act. Rather, prayer is commanded in unqualified terms, while occupying that place is prohibited. Thus, the command and the prohibition concern different things, though these become inseparably joined in the particular instance. It is the servant who has combined what is commanded with what is prohibited; the Lawgiver has not commanded him to combine them. He commanded prayer in unqualified terms and prohibited occupancy in unqualified terms. As for the particular instance itself, the Lawgiver neither commands nor prohibits it, just as with all other particular instances. This principle applies consistently to everything Allah has commanded in unqualified terms—indeed, to every command.

For when He commands the freeing of a slave without specifying one, as in His words:

‘Then a slave must be freed,’

or the feeding of sixty needy people, fasting for two consecutive months, prayer in a place, or anything else, the servant can comply only by freeing a particular slave, feeding particular food to particular needy people, fasting on particular days, and performing a prayer