Know, may God help us and you with a spirit from Him, that God Almighty did not inform His Prophet, may God bless him and grant him peace, of his closeness to those who ask of His servants for an answer in what they ask him about, except that He has equaled us in knowledge of God in this respect, even if this divine closeness in the answer was His closeness in the distance about which He mentioned. That he is closer to a person than his jugular vein would have sufficed, because this closeness does not necessitate hearing, just as hearing in a question does not necessitate an answer. So the benefit derived from this definition is three things: proximity, hearing, and an answer. He did not leave his servant an argument against him, but rather God has the ultimate proof. So if the servant is established in this remembrance, then first. What results in him is asceticism in anything other than God, so he should not beg Him by anything other than Him, for begging is only a request to be