they proffer advice. For instance, one of them, not being content with the Shari'a's method of restraint, said something in a large gathering to put people off intoxicants, but I was ashamed to write it and crossed it out. You scoundrel, you're opposing the Shari'a with these words of yours! Supposing you were faithful to it even, you would still be foolishly faithful. You're more harmful than the worst enemy.

#### Conclusion

Conclusion

O you unfair people who try to criticise Islam from outside and from afar! Don't be deceived! Think and reason! Don't make do with looking superficially, for those people who are the cause of these pretexts of yours are called "reprehensible religious scholars" (lit. scholars of evil, wickedness — ulema-i sû') in the language of the Shari'a. Look beyond the veil caused by their imbalance and externalist literalness. You'll see that each truth of Islam is a light-scattering proof, like a luminous star. It appears within a tapestry stretching from pre-eternity to post-eternity. Indeed, that which proceeds from pre-eternal divine speech will go to post-eternity. But alas! Due to love of self and taking the part of oneself and exonerating oneself, which arise from egotism and impotence, they blame their own faults on others. They want to exonerate themselves by ascribing something they say or do that might possibly be wrong to some lofty person or esteemed book, or even sometimes to religion and very often to Hadiths, and finally to divine determining. God forbid! Darkness cannot come from light. Even if they conceal the stars appearing in their own mirrors, they cannot hide the stars in the sky. It's only themselves who can't see them!

Kind sir who objects and opposes! It is a great injustice to regard as proofs doubts arising from misunderstandings or attitudes springing from opposition to the Shari'a, and to seek pretexts like a child looking for something to cry about or a rancorous enemy seeking revenge, and so to tarnish Islam. For not every attribute a Muslim possesses, has to derive from Islam.