the unbeliever, and that He assisted him in obedience with assistance that He did not grant the unbeliever, as Allah Most High said:

“But Allah has endeared faith to you and made it beautiful in your hearts, and He has made disbelief, wickedness, and disobedience hateful to you. Those are the rightly guided.”

[Surah al-Hujurāt: 7]

Thus, He made clear that He endeared faith to them and adorned it in their hearts.

The Qadariyya say (1): “This endearment and adornment apply universally to all creation (2), or it (3) means merely clarification and the presentation of the proofs of the truth.” Yet the verse requires that this be specific to the believers. For this reason, He said:

“Those are the rightly guided.”

The unbelievers, however, are not rightly guided.

Allah Most High said:

“Whomever Allah wills to guide, He opens his breast to Islam; and whomever He wills to lead astray, He makes his breast tight and constricted, as though he were ascending into the sky.”

[Surah al-An‘ām: 125]

And He said:

“Is one who was dead and whom We brought to life, and for whom We made a light by which he walks among the people, like one who is in layers of darkness from which he will never emerge? Thus, what the unbelievers used to do was made appealing to them.”

[Surah al-An‘ām: 122]

Allah Most High said:

“Thus We have tested some of them by means of others, so that they might say, ‘Are these the ones upon whom Allah has bestowed His favor from among us?’ Does Allah not know best those who are grateful?”

[Surah al-An‘ām: 53]

Allah Most High said:

“They regard their acceptance of Islam as a favor to you. Say, ‘Do not regard your Islam as a favor to me. Rather, Allah has bestowed favor upon you by guiding you to faith, if you are truthful.’”

[Surah al-Hujurāt: 17]