Third Example: One of the valuable results and exalted principles of the line of prophethood concerning Divine unity is: "If a thing has unity, it must proceed from only one." That is, "Since each thing in itself and all things collectively have unity, they therefore must be the creation of one single being." Whereas, one of the beliefs of ancient philosophy is: "From one, one proceeds." That is, "From one person, only one single thing can proceed. Everything else proceeds from him by means of intermediaries."

This misleading principle of philosophy, which is stained by associating partners with God, presents the Absolutely Self-Sufficient and Omnipotent One as being in need of impotent intermediaries, and gives all causes and intermediaries a sort of partnership in His dominicality. It attributes to the Glorious Creator the title of 'Prime Mover', which in fact indicates the status of creature. Moreover, it allots the rest of His sovereignty to causes and intermediaries, thus opening the way to associating partners with Him in a most comprehensive manner. If the Illuminists (Ishraqiyyun), who were preeminent philosophers, uttered nonsense like this, you can imagine how much more absurd will be what inferior philosophers, like the Materialists and Naturalists, say.

Fourth Example: According to the meaning of,

There is nothing but extols His limitless glory and praise,¹⁵

which is one of the wise principles of prophethood, "If the purpose and wisdom of everything, in particular every living being, has one aspect which looks to the being itself, then the purposes which concern its Maker and the instances of wisdom which look to its Creator must be myriad. Each thing, a single fruit, for example, has as much wisdom and as many purposes as all the fruits of a tree." This principle, which is pure truth, results from the joining of one of the forms of philosophy with the line of prophethood.

Whereas, the nonsensical principles of a deceiving philosophy that has not joined this line says: "The purpose of every living being looks to itself or is connected with benefits for mankind," thus considering in it an extremely senseless futility and attaching a purpose, a tiny fruit, to a tree as huge as a mountain. Because this truth has been explained to some extent in the Tenth Truth of the Tenth Word and some parts have been mentioned in the treatise called Lemeat (Gleams), we have cut it short here. However, you can extend these four examples to thousands.

It is because of these rotten foundations and disastrous results of philosophy that geniuses from among the Muslim philosophers like Ibn-i Sina and Farabi were charmed by its apparent glitter and were deceived into taking this way, and thus attained only the rank of an ordinary believer. Hujjat al-Islam al-Ghazzali did not accord them that rank, even.

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15.Qur'an 17:44