the insinuation of falsehoods into the sacred law of true guidance. It is incumbent upon Us to protect the sacred law when it prevails, just as it was incumbent upon Us to protect it at the time of its creation."
But a miracles validity as evidence of the veracity of a claimant to prophethood depends on the assumption that the intellect can distinguish good from evil. How‌ ever, the Asharites, who reject this assumption and deny that reason is capable of such a judgment, have perforce closed the door on confirming prophethood. This is one of the errors of their doctrine, for their assertion closes the door against confirm‌ ing prophethood. This is because miracles are evidence of the veracity of prophethood only if it seems improper for the mind that miracles can be wrought by a liar. If the intellect does not see the matter as such, then no one can distinguish the true prophet from the false one.
Al-Fa<;ll b. Ruzbihan has responded to this problem by asserting that, although it is possible for God to do evil, it is however His practice to limit the working of miracles to genuine prophets, so that a miracle cannot be wrought at the hands of a liar; accord‌ ingly, the Asharite doctrine does not entail closing the door to belief in prophethood. The weakness and incoherence of this response is obvious, however. First, the divine practice mentioned by Ibn Ruzbihan is not one of the things that can be perceived through the senses or discerned by the eye and the ear. Therefore, the only way to knowledge in this matter is through the intellect. If the intellect were unable to differ‌ entiate between good and evil, as al-Asharrmaintains, it would then be impossible for anyone to know definitely about divine practice.
Second, the confirmation of this divine practice depends on our faith in earlier prophets who worked miracles. By having such faith, we would know that the di‌ vine practice is to bestow the ability to work miracles exclusively on the veracious. As for those who deny the prophethood of earlier prophets, or doubt them, they have no way of establishing the divine practice affirmed by Ibn Ruzbihan, and thus the evidence of working miracles does not hold for them.
Third, if the intellect equates doing a thing with not doing it, and if it does not pass judgment as to whether this action or inaction is good or evil, what is then to prevent God from changing His practice? After all, He is the Omnipotent who does not have to account for what He does, and thus, He can, if He will, manifest miracles at the hands of a liar!
Fourth, a practice consists of contingent actions, which become a practice after regular repetition. A practice is therefore established over a period of time. Such being the case, what is the proof of the truthfulness of the first truthful prophethood before this practice was established? We will discuss the doctrine of the Asharites as we clarify their error.

The Best Miracles Are Those Which Best Resemble the Most Advanced Arts of the Time

A miracle, as explained above, is an occurrence that breaks the laws of nature and which other human beings cannot imitate when a prophet-claimant performs it to demonstrate the truthfulness of his claim. What is beyond doubt is that a miracle can be recognized as such only by specialists in the art the miracle resembles. This is