Praise be to Allah, Creator of people; He has spread the earth. He makes streams to flow and vegetation to grow on high lands. His primality has no beginning, nor has His eternity any end. He is the First and from ever. He is the everlasting without limit.
Foreheads bow before Him and lips declare His oneness. He determined the limits
of things at the time of His creating them, keeping Himself away from any likeness.
Imagination cannot surmise Him within the limits of movements limbs or senses.
It cannot be said about Him: "whence"; and no time limit can be attributed
to Him by saying "till". He is apparent, but it cannot be said "from
what".
He is hidden, but it cannot be said "in what". He is not a body which
can die, nor is He veiled so as to be enclosed therein. He is not near to things
by way of touch, nor is He remote from them by way of separation.
The gazing of people's eyes is not hidden from Him, nor the repetition of words,
nor the glimpse of hillocks, nor the tread of a footstep in the dark night or
in the deep gloom, where the shining moon casts its light and the effulgent
sun comes in its wake, through its setting and appearing again and again with
the rotation of time and periods, by the approach of the advancing night or
the passing away of the running day.
He precedes every extremity and limit, and every counting and numbering. He
is far above what those whose regard is limited attribute to Him, such as the
qualities of measure, having extremities, living in house and dwelling in abodes,
because limits are meant for creation and are attributable only to other than
Allah.
Allah, the Originator from naught
He did not create things from eternal matter nor after ever-existing examples,
but He created whatever He created and then He fixed limits thereto, and He
shaped whatever He shaped and gave the best shape thereto. Nothing can disobey
Him, but the obedience of something is of no benefit to Him.
His knowledge about those who died in the past is the same as His knowledge
about the remaining survivors, and His knowledge about whatever there is in
the high skies is like His knowledge of whatever there is in the low earth.
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Nahul Balagha, Sermon 163