vastest things, like the divine throne, so they look to the smallest, like an atom. And just as they create the sun and moon, so they create the eyes of the flea and gnat. And just as they lay down the elevated order of the universe, so they place a fine order in the guts of microscopic organisms. And just as they bind together the celestial bodies and stars, suspended [in space] by that law of His known as gravity, so they order minute particles through a similar law, as infinitesimal samples of them. It is through the intervention of impotence that different degrees occur in power. So all things are equal in the face of the power of the One for whom impotence is impossible. For impotence is the opposite of essential power.1
The Sixth: Divine power looks first (ta‘alluq) to the inner face (malakūtiyya) of things, and this in all things is transparent and beautiful, as discussed. Yes, just as the Most High made the face of the sun burnished and shining and the moon incandescent, so He made the inner face of the night and clouds luminous and beautiful.
The Seventh: The human mind does not have the breadth and scope to measure divine grandeur (May He be exalted), weigh up [the Most High’s] perfections, or to judge His attributes. This is not possible except in one respect2 – they may be gauged only from the sum total of His artefacts, and from what is manifested of all His works, and from what may be epitomized from all His acts. Yes, an atom can only be a mirror, not the measure.
If you have understood these matters, know that the Necessary Being (Be He exalted) cannot be compared with contingent beings, for they are as different from one another as are the ground and the Pleiades. Surely you can see that it was because of this false comparison, that with the Naturalists, the Mu‘tazilites, and Zoroastrians their powers of delusive imagination overpowered their reasons, and they ascribed an actual effect to causes, and the creation of acts to living creatures, and the creation of evil to one other than Allah (May He be exalted!). With their delusions and imaginings they asked how with His grandeur, sublimity, and freedom from defect (tanazzuh) Allah (May He be exalted!) would condescend to [create] these base matters and ugly things. To hell with them! How could they shackle the intellect with such a feeble delusion? But alas! As a whispering doubt it afflicts believers also. So be careful to avoid it!
For the New Said’s cogent proofs of divine power, see the Twentieth Letter, Nursi, Letters 1928-1932 (Istanbul: Sözler Publications, 2001), 291-99.
That is, the human mind can comprehend the divine attributes only to the extent a person can attain knowledge of them through observation of the divine works.