I said to our Master al-Sadiq - majestic is his praise - and I had secluded myself with him and found an opportunity from him which I desired: "I ask you, O my Master, about what occurred in my mind regarding the manifestation of the Meaning (al-Ma'na) to His creation in the visible form. Does the Essence (al-Dhat) take a form, or divide, or become apportioned,

or transform from its being, or is it imagined in the intellects through movement or stillness? And how is the manifestation of the unseen by a weak creation? And how can the created bear looking at the Creator with the weakness in the created?"

So he said: "O Mufaddal, indeed in the creation of the heavens and the earth, and the alternation of the night and the day, are signs for those of understanding. O Mufaddal, our knowledge is difficult, made difficult, and our secret is rugged, far from the tongue to translate it except by allusion. And our Shia do not recognize except according to their comprehension of us and their recognition of us. And away with whoever narrates what he does not comprehend, and believes what does not process in his intellect and is not clear in his core. And that is the faith of the tongue and the ruggedness of the senses, and the proof in it is against its owner. And that is [because] the Quran was revealed upon 'I mean you, and listen, O neighbor.' So listen to what is revealed to you, and look with the eye of your intellect, and set up with the light of your core, and listen and comprehend. For you have asked about a great clarification and a true certainty,