—this noble verse that the author has cited, “Behold! The awliyāʾ of Allah—no fear shall be upon them, nor shall they grieve; those who have believed and remained mindful of Him.” God willing, the author will soon mention the Quranic verses, prophetic hadiths, and actual events that demonstrate this reality.
He will also explain the difference between three things:
- the prophetic sign,
- the karāmah granted to a wali, and
- the trickery performed by an enemy of Allah.
A prophetic sign is an extraordinary event that Allah manifests at the hands of His prophet to support and verify him—such as Jesus (peace be upon him) bringing the dead to life. Jesus, son of Mary, would in fact draw the dead out of their graves after burial, just as Allah says, “and when you bring forth the dead by My permission.” He would stand by the grave, call its occupant, and the person would emerge alive. He cured those born blind and the leper. He fashioned a figure of a bird out of clay, then breathed into it, and—by Allah’s permission—it became a living bird that flew away before him. Moments earlier it was only clay; once he breathed into it, it took flight. All of this is among the signs of Allah.
Thus, the signs granted to the prophets are extraordinary phenomena that Allah displays through them as a means of supporting them.
As for the karāmāt of the awliyāʾ, they too are extraordinary, but they are not given to prophets themselves; rather, they appear in the hands of those who follow the prophets. A case in point is what occurred to Mary, daughter of ʿImrān:
“Then the pains of labor drove her to the trunk of a date-palm. She said, ‘Would that I had died before this and been forgotten, utterly forgotten!’ Thereupon he called to her from below her, ‘Do not grieve; your Lord has placed a stream beneath you. Shake toward yourself the trunk of the palm-tree; it will drop fresh, ripe dates upon you.’”
This is one of Allah’s signs and a karāmah granted to Mary: a woman in labor beneath a palm-tree, shaking its trunk. Shaking the top of a palm might be feasible, but shaking the trunk itself is difficult. Yet she shook the trunk, and fresh, ripe dates fell down for her.