The fourth kind of occasion is quite opposite to the former. In this it is very difficult to understand that it is an example, but when once understood, you can easily comprehend the thing illustrated. In the interpretation of this also, there is a consideration: about those people who know that if it is an example, it illustrates such and such a thing; but they doubt whether it is an illustration at all. If they are not learned people, the best thing to do with them is not to make any interpretation, but only to prove the fallacy of the views which they hold about its being an illustration at all. It is also possible that an interpretation may make them still distant from the truth, on account of the nature of the illustration and the illustrated. For these two kinds of occasions if an interpretation is given, they give rise to strange beliefs, far from the law which when disclosed are denied by the common people, Such has been the case with the Sufis, and those learned men who have followed them. When this work of interpretation was done by people who could not distinguish between these occasions, and made no distinction between the people for whom the interpretation is to be made, there arose differences of opinion, at last forming into sects, which ended in accusing one another with unbelief. All this is pure ignorance of the purpose of the Law. From what we have already said the amount of mischief done by interpretation must have become clear to you. We always try to acquire our purpose by knowing what should be interpreted, and what not, and when interpreted, how it should be done; and whether all the difficult portions of the Law and Traditions are to be explained or not. These are all included in the four kinds which have already been enumerated. The purpose of our writing this book is now completed. We took it up because we thought that it was the most important of all purposes--connected with God and the Law. FOOTNOTES [Footnote 25: A translation of _Al-Kashf’an Manhij i’l Adillah fi Aqaid il Millah, we Tarif ma Waqa fiha bi Hasb i’l Ta’wil min Shubhi’l Muzighah wa Bid’ill Mudillah_.] [Footnote 26: Quran ii, 19.] [Footnote 27: Quran xiv, 11.] [Footnote 28: Quran xxxix, 39.] [Footnote 29: Quran vi, 75.] [Footnote 30: Quran xvi, 42.] [Footnote 31: Quran ii, 282.] [Footnote 32: Quran xxix, 69.] [Footnote 33: Quran viii, 29.] [Footnote 34: Quran xxii, 72.] [Footnote 35: Quran vii, 184.] [Footnote 36: Quran lxxvii, 6-16.] [Footnote 37: Quran xxv, 62.] [Footnote 38: Quran lxxx, 24.] [Footnote 39: Quran lxxxvi, 6.] [Footnote 40: Quran lxxxviii, 17.] [Footnote 41: Quran xxii, 72.] [Footnote 42: Quran vi, 79. The story referred to will be found in the preceding verses.] [Footnote 43: Quran ii, 19.] [Footnote 44: Quran xxxvi, 33.] [Footnote 45: Quran iii, 188.] [Footnote 46: Quran vii, 171.] [Footnote 47: Quran iii, 16.] [Footnote 48: Quran xvii, 46.] [Footnote 49: Quran xxi, 22.]