…to the prophets comes from it alone, and that it is the ultimate return of souls.

Their denial of Allah’s power and will is even graver than their denial of His knowledge of particulars, for many people may be unaware of the latter yet still know that Allah is able to create things by His will. In the two Ṣaḥīḥs it is related from Ibn Masʿūd:

“Three men—two from Quraysh and one from Thaqīf, or two from Thaqīf and one from Quraysh—whose bellies were heavy with fat though their hearts held little understanding, gathered beside the Kaʿbah. One of them said, ‘Do you think Allah hears what we are saying?’ The second replied, ‘He hears us if we speak aloud, but He does not hear us when we speak softly.’ The third remarked, ‘If He hears us when we speak aloud, then He certainly hears us when we speak softly.’ Thereupon Allah revealed:
‘You did not hide yourselves lest your hearing, your sight, and your skins testify against you; rather, you supposed that Allah did not know much of what you were doing. That very supposition you entertained about your Lord has ruined you, so now you find yourselves among the losers.’ (Qurʾan 41:22–23)”

Those men acknowledged that Allah created the heavens and the earth by His will and power. In the same way, some novices among the Muslims might ask, “Messenger of Allah, does Allah really know whatever people conceal?” and the Prophet—peace and blessings be upon him—would answer, “Yes.” Such people never doubted that Allah created everything by His will and power; this was among the clearest and most widely recognized truths, not only for ordinary Muslims but even for the idol-worshipping polytheists—the very unbelievers whom the Prophet fought and whom the Qurʾan censures first and foremost. Despite their idolatry, they still admitted that Allah created the heavens, the earth, and all that lies between them, and that He fashioned everything by His power and will. In this respect they were in a better state than these philosophers, for they affirmed that Allah is the Creator, Lord, and Sovereign of all things and that He brought the universe into being by His volition and power.

By contrast, the philosophers’ real position is that He has created nothing at all. Their early spokesman, Aristotle, and those who followed him, held that He is merely a cause for whose sake the celestial sphere moves in imitation; for them He is neither one who necessitates existence by His very essence nor one who acts by choice. Ibn Sīnā and others who claim that He produces things “by the necessity of His essence” are in fact asserting what every sound-minded person knows to be…