And verily Our messengers came to Abraham with good tidings, to the end of this [verse]: noble human souls possess connections with higher disengaged principles and the holy spirits of the celestial spheres in the way of the vanquishing intellectual lights and the heavenly governing souls and [they also enjoy] mixing with the higher council of the inhabitants of the realm of [divine] invincibility (jabarūt) and ingressions into the realm of dominion (malakūt). For each soul, depending on its primordial nature, there is a principle that corresponds to it from the realm of invincibility and a governor that nurtures it from the realm of dominion. From the former [the principle] it derives the effusion of knowledge and light, while from the latter [the governor] it derives its supply of strength and deeds, as alluded to by His words and every soul will come accompanied by a driver and a witness [Q. 50:21]. And [for each soul] there is also an original resting-place to which it resorts from the Side of the realm of the Divine Essence (lāhūt) should it disengage, as he [the Prophet] said, 'The spirits of martyrs shelter in lanterns of light that hang from below the Throne'. Every time that it [a soul] is attracted to the lower aspect by inclining to natural physical pleasures, it is veiled by the subsequent coverings from that [Divine] Side and is cut off from the supplies that it receives from that aspect in the way of the lights of invincibility and the angelic faculties. As such it becomes weaker in its perception, since it has become veiled from the reception of those irradiations and [weaker] in vigour and strength, cut off as it is from those supplies [provided] by that [angelic] faculty. But each time that it orients itself towards the higher aspect by rising above corporeal configurations and disengaging from material garments and drawing closer to God, the Principle of all principles and the Light of all lights, exalted be He, by [acts of] renunciation and worship and by adhering to these principles with cleanliness and probity, with his [this person's] deeds bound to sincerity of intention and devoted conscience, God will reinforce that person, by virtue of his correspondence with the residents of His presence, from their world with the reinforcement of light and power so that it [that soul] will know what no one else knows from among those of its own genus and will have the power to do what no one else will have the power to do from among those of its own species; it will also have moments in which it penetrates that [world] by detaching itself from its body and other moments where it will be remote therefrom depending on what afflicts it from [its] governance of its body.
