NOTES: _____________________ 1.

NOTES: _____________________ 1. According to Ibn Abi-l-Hadid, this sentence is based upon the following Quranic verse: “The devil promises you poverty and bids you unto indecency, but God promises you His pardon and His bounty” (2:268). He explains that the commentators of the Qur’an say that here “indecency” (al-fahsha’) means “miserliness” (al-bukhl), and that the meaning of “promises you poverty” is that he makes you believe you will become poor if you are generous with your wealth (vol.

I7, p. 4I). 2. Ibn Abi-l-Hadid comments that if a man trusts God with certainty and sincerity, he will know that his life span, his daily provision, his wealth and his poverty are foreordained and that nothing occurs but by God’s decree (vol. I7, p. 4I).

Ibn Maytham points out that “distrust in God begins with lack of knowledge (marifah) of Him.” A person ignorant of His generosity and bounty will not know that He rewards what is expended in His path; hence he will be miserly in order to avoid poverty. He makes similar remarks concerning the qualities of cowardliness and greed. 3. According to Ibn-Maytham, this sentence is part of the description of those favourites who should be most influential.

It means that the ruler “should train and discipline them by forbidding them from praising him lavishly or trying to make him happy by a false statement in which they attribute to him an act which he did not do and by this attribution causes him to be blameworthy.” He then quotes the following verse of the Quran: “Reckon not that those who rejoice in what they have brought, and love to be praised for what they have not done-do not reckon them secure from chastisement” (3:I88). 4.

“The evil-doer has imposed upon himself worthiness for punishment and the good-doer worthiness for reward” (Muhammad ‘Abduh, vol. 3, p. 98). 5. Ibn Abi-l-Hadid comments on this passage as follows: “Whoever does good toward you will trust you and whoever does evil will shy away from you. This is because when you do well to someone and repeat it, you will come to believe that he likes you, and this belief will in turn lead to your liking him, for man by his very nature likes anyone who likes him.

Then when you like him, you will feel secure with him and trust him. The reverse is true when you do evil toward someone . . .” (vol. I7, p. 47). 6.