As for the meaning of its saying: 'O Hidden, O Manifest,' it means he has acquired the knowledge of the esoteric and the exoteric."

And this indicates that He [the Divine] continues to appear to them through ruse (makr) and dissimulation by means of sayings and the manifestation of human states upon him, as He, the Exalted, informed us in Surah Al-An'am: {And We will turn away their hearts and their eyes just as they refused to believe in it the first time. And We will leave them in their transgression, wandering blindly} (Al-An'am 110). Also, had they believed in him, He, Glorified be He, would not have turned away their eyes and their hearts.

And among the explicit sayings is his declaration in the Sermon of al-Tutunjiya: "I am the First, not from a thing did I begin; and the Last, not to a thing do I end; and the Manifest, not from a thing did I appear; and the Hidden, not by a thing did I conceal myself; and the Knower, not by a taught knowledge did I know; and the Powerful, not by a granted power was I capable."

And He, the Exalted, said: {He is the First and the Last, the Manifest and the Hidden, and He is Knowing of all things} (Al-Hadid 3).

And he described himself with veracity in the Sermon of the Regions (Khutbat al-Aqalim), as an admonition to us to affirm his established words, by his saying: “I am the Proclaimer of the Truth; I am the Speaker of Veracity.”