Letters ( revised ) | THE TWENTIETH LETTER | 292
(261-302)
If the memory and the mirror from the external world had possessed consciousness and creative power, they would have been able to bring about endless transformations  and activit y in the Worlds of Meaning and Similitudes through the power of their minute existences in the external world. That is to say, when existence is firmly established, power increases; what is only a little becomes much. Especially if having acquired complete stability existence is disengaged and detached from materiality and is not restricted, only a partial manifestation of it will be able to transform many worlds of other less substantial levels of existence.

Thus,  “And  God’s  is  the  highest  similitude,”(16:60)  the  universe’s  Glorious Maker is Necessarily Existent. That is, His existence is essential, it is pre-eternal and post-eternal, its non-existence is impossible, its cessation is impossible; it is the most firmly rooted, the most sound, the strongest, and the most perfect of the levels of existence. In relation to His existence, the other levels of existence are like extremely pale shadows.

The degree of Necessary Existence is so stable and real, and contingent existence is so insubstantial and pale that many of those who have investigated creation, such as Muhyi al-Din al-‘Arabi, have relegated the other levels of existence to the level of delusion and imagination; they said: “There is no existent save Him.” That is, things should not be ascribed existence relatively to the Necessary Existence. They asserted that they do not deserve to be called existent.

Thus, for the Necessarily Existent One’s power, which is both necessary and essential, contingent beings’ both created and accidental existences and both unstable and powerless realities are infinitely easy and simple. To raise all human beings to life and then judge them at the Great Gathering is as easy as resurrecting leaves, flowers and fruits in the spring, indeed, in a garden, or on a tree.

Second Mystery: Easiness in regard to the complete otherness of His Essence and His unrestrictedness arises from this: most certainly, the universe’s Maker is not of the same kind as the universe. His Essence resembles no other essence at all. Since this is so, the obstacles and restraints within the sphere of the universe cannot hinder Him, they cannot restrict His actions. He has complete disposal over the universe and is able to transform  all of it at the same time. If the disposal and actions that are apparent in the universe were to be attributed to it, it would cause so many difficulties and such confusion that neither would any order remain nor would anything continue to exist; indeed, nothing would ever come into existence.

No Voice

Letters ( revised )