157 – Muḥammad ibn Ismāʿīl ibn Ibrāhīm al-ʿAnazī al-Kūfī narrated to me, from Jābir ibn ʿAwn al-Asadī, who said:

The first words Sulaymān ibn ʿAbd al-Malik ever spoke were:

“Praise be to Allah: whatever He wills, He does; whatever He wills, He raises; whatever He wills, He lowers; whatever He wills, He bestows; and whomever He wills, He withholds from. This world is an abode of deception, a false lodging, an ornament that keeps turning about. It makes the weeping laugh and the laughing weep; it terrifies the secure and reassures the fearful; it impoverishes its wealthy and enriches its poor. Fickle and playful, it toys with its people.

Servants of Allah, take the Book of Allah as your guide, be satisfied with its judgment, and let it lead you, for it abrogates whatever preceded it, and no book after it will ever abrogate it. Know, servants of Allah, that this Quran exposes Satan’s schemes and his malice just as the radiance of dawn, when it breathes, disperses the retreating darkness of night when it is at its thickest.”