nor does he trust them, place his hopes in them, or fear them; for no cause in existence can independently produce an effect. Rather, every cause requires other factors to be joined to it, and it is subject to impediments and obstacles that prevent the outcome it would otherwise entail. No cause independently brings anything into being except Allah’s will alone. Whatever He wills comes to pass, and whatever He does not will does not come to pass. Whatever He wills, He creates through causes that He brings into being, while removing the impediments to it. Reliance may therefore be placed in Him alone.

As Allah Most High says:

“If Allah helps you, none can overcome you; but if He forsakes you, who then can help you after Him? So let the believers rely upon Allah.”

[Surah Āl Imrān: 160]

Whatever was already established in His knowledge and decree is true. He knew and decreed that He—glorified be He—would bring such-and-such a thing into being through such-and-such a cause. Whoever considers His knowledge and decree must recognize that it comes into being through that by which He brought it into being. If he views it as coming into being without any cause for it, his witnessing does not accord with His knowledge and decree.

Thus, whoever witnesses that Allah Most High created a child without parents simply because His knowledge and decree had already established it—such witnessing is blindness. Rather, he must witness that Allah—blessed and exalted is He—had already known and decreed that He would create the child from its parents, and that the parents are a cause of the child’s existence.

How, then, can it be said that His knowledge and decree had already established that the child would come into being without a cause? If His knowledge and decree affirm the cause, how can I view things as contrary to their [actual state] (1) in His knowledge and decree?

The faults that must be rejected are of two kinds. The first is to depend upon causes and place one’s reliance in them. This is a prohibited form of associating partners with Allah (2).

The second is to abandon the causes that one has been commanded to employ,