numerous, is the least stable level of existence and the least tangible, the most changing and the most varying and the most dispersed through space; they ascribe pre-eternity to them and fancy them to be pre-eternal; and some of them even suppose that it is out of them that the divine works arise. It has been demonstrated through cogent arguments in many places in the Risale-i Nur how contrary to truth and reality, how unreasonable and absurd, is this idea.
SECOND RAY
This consists of two matters.
F i r s t M a t t e r :
Neither sleep overcomes Him nor slumber.(2:255) * There is not a moving creature but He has grasp of its forelock.(11:56) * To Him belong the keys of the heavens and the earth.(39:63; 42:12)
These verses point to a greatest manifestation of the name Self-Subsistent. One aspect of the mighty truth that these and verses like them indicate is as follows:
The existence, continuance, and perpetuation of the heavenly bodies in the universe are tied to the mystery of Self-Subsistence. If the manifestation of Self-Subsistence were to avert its face for a moment, millions of globes, some of them a thousand times larger than the earth, would be scattered into the infinite void of space, and colliding with one another would crash into nothingness.
For example, the power of the Self-Subsistence of the One who keeps thousands of stately palaces in place in perfect order and makes them travel like aircraft through space is measured through the stability, order, and continuance of those palaces in space. So too a measure of the greatest manifestation of the name Self-Subsistent are the facts that the All-Glorious and Self-Subsistent One bestows on the innumerable heavenly bodies within ethereal matter a stability, permanence, and continuance within the utmost order and balance through the mystery of Self-Subsistence; and together with upholding without prop or support in the void millions of mighty globes, some a thousand and some even a million times larger than the earth, entrusts them all with duties and causes them to submit in perfect obedience like a majestic army to the decrees proceeding from the command of “‘Be!’ and it is.” The particles of all beings also exist, like the stars, through the mystery of Self-Subsistence, and are permanent and continue through it.
The particles in an animate creature’s body do not disperse but are assembled in groups and systems peculiar to each limb, and without