11. Hud

save those who endure [patiently], an exceptive clause [referring back] to 'man': in other words, this species [of man] is despairing, ungrateful, exultant, and boastful in both states, except those who endure patiently with God, halting with Him in [both] the states of adversity and fortune, hardship and comfort, as ʿUmar [b. al-Khaṭṭāb], may God be satisfied with him: 'Poverty and wealth are [like] two riding animals. I do not mind which of the two I ride'; and who perform, in both states, what is in their best interest of what has been mentioned; those, theirs will be forgiveness, from the sins of the soul manifesting itself in despair, ingratitude, exultation and boastfulness in both states, and a great recompense, in the way of the reward of the self-disclosures of the acts and the attributes and the Gardens of these two.

Perhaps, you might [think to] leave out some of what is revealed to you: when they failed to accept his speech, may God bless him and grant him peace, by [their] volition and repudiated what he said with corrupt requests [of their own], countering it with obstinacy and mockery, his breast became straitened and was not expanded for the [reception of the divine] speech. For volition attracts speech and the receptivity of the listener increases the energy of the speaker and makes him expansive therein; but if the speaker does not find a receptive locus, it is not facilitated for him and becomes [a source of] anxiety for him. Consequently, God gave him heart with these [words] and spurred his faculty and his energy with His words: You are but a warner, and your warning will always accomplish one of two things. It will either remove the veil and have a successful effect on the one whom God has granted success for that purpose; or it will serve as a definitive argument against the one who is not granted such success. And God is Guardian over all things, so entrust guardianship of the guiding [of people] to Him.

He who desires the life of this world: in other words, every person who performs a deed, even if that [deed] should seem to belong to the deeds of the Hereafter outwardly, with the intention of [gaining things of] this world and solely desiring a share of its shares, God, exalted be He, shall repay him in full the recompense for it therein, but nothing of the reward of the Hereafter shall reach him. To every person there belongs a portion of this world in accordance with the plane [of creation] upon which he is and a portion of the Hereafter in accordance with the primordial nature upon which he was created. Thus if he only desires this world with his deeds, then he [himself] has turned his face towards it and has turned away from the Hereafter, and he will have made, by his being attracted and oriented towards the lower aspect, his this-worldly portion the very thing that veils [him] from his other-worldly portion, such that his primordial nature degenerates and follows the plane [of creation] and his soul begins to employ the heart in the pursuit of its shares and so his other-worldly portion becomes joined to his this-worldly portion: and therein they shall not be defrauded, in other words, they shall not be diminished, that is, nothing of the reward for their deeds shall be diminished in this world, because when the heart is configured according to the mien of the soul, its share takes on the form of the share of the soul.

Is he who relies on a clear proof from his Lord: that is, is he who desires the life of this world like the one who is upon a clear proof from his Lordḍ In other words, there is a tremendous distance between the two in terms of level. As for the one who relies on a clear proof, [this means]: a certainty on the basis of rational demonstration (burhān ʿaqlī) or one on the basis of an ecstatic consciousness of unveiling and there follows that certainty, a witness, from his Lord, namely, the QurÌān that confirms the veracity of the rational demonstration in terms of the affirmation of Oneness as well as the soundness of [Muḥammad's] prophethood and the principles of religion; and before this QurÌān [there was], the Book of Moses: in other words, there followed the demonstration before this Book the Book of Moses being in that state, as a standard, to be followed and an exemplar to be held on to in realising goals and a mercy from the Merciful that guides people, cleanses them and instructs them in wisdoms and precepts. Those they believe in it, in reality unlike those who seek the shares of this world.

And who does greater wrong than he who invents a lie concerning Godḍ, by affirming the existence of another besides Him and ascribing an attribute of His, such as His speech and the like, to anotherḍ Those, they shall be brought before their Lord, by halting at the first halting place, veiled and forsaken, and the witnesses, the affirmers of Oneness, will say: 'These are they who lied concerning their Lord', by means of [their] idolatrous association. They are then driven away and cursed on account of their idolatrous association, [a sin] which is the gravest of injustice;

they who bar, people from the way of God's Oneness and describe this [way] as being crooked despite its straightness, and who, in addition to being veiled from the Truth, are veiled from the Hereafter to the exclusion of others from among the followers of religions.