And the proof of the third meaning is the speech of the Almighty...

And the proof of the third meaning is the speech of the Almighty: Upon the day when the spirit and the angels stand in ranks [78:38]. And the proof of the fourth meaning is the saying of the Almighty: Say, "The Holy Spirit has revealed it" [16:102], that is, Jibril, peace be upon him.

As for the narrations which Abu Ja‘far reports, that souls were created two thousand years before the bodies; and that those of them who were acquainted with each other are intimate, and those who were strangers to each other are disparate[^2] , it is, in fact, an ahad tradition and a report unsupported except by one narrator. Nevertheless, it bears an interpretation which differs from that adopted by those who are not acquainted with the fact of the matter.

Hence, the sound interpretation is that Allah, the Exalted, created the angels two thousand years before mankind; then those amongst them who were acquainted with each other before the creation of men are also intimate after the creation of men; whereas those among them who were strangers to each other before, are also strangers after the creation of men. Then, the reality is far from what is maintained by the adherents of transmigration.

This specious doctrine has crept into the Hashwites in the ranks of the Shi‘ah; who erroneously alleged that our beings which are subject to the commands and prohibitions of Allah were created in the world of atoms (‘alamu 'dh- dhar), and that they were acquainted with each other and endued with the faculties of discernment, comprehension and speech; then Allah created bodies for them after that and put them together.

(Do they not realize) that if this were so, then we would know the state which we occupied before, and that if it were recalled to us, we would remember it and nothing of it would be hidden from us?

Do you not realize that if someone was brought up in a place and settled there for a year, and then turned away from it to a second place, he will never forget what he knows about it; and that if he forgets it through absent- mindedness, it would be easy for him to remember it if he was reminded of it?

If this was so, then would it be probable that one of us, who was born in Baghdad and settled there for twenty years and then immigrated to another place, would forget all that happened to him at Baghdad even if he were reminded of it in detail? In fact, this is an assumption which no one endowed with reason will make.