Your Honour, the letter you wrote to ‘Abdul-Hakim says that faith based only upon natural instinct is something accursed. I am unable to understand what this means also.
The Answer: The sum and substance of what I have written is that faith, which is not acquired through the Messenger of Allah, and only exists in the case where human nature feels the need for the existence of God Almighty—as is the faith of philosophers—generally ends up as accursed. Since such a faith is not free from darkness, those people soon slip from their faith into atheism. At first, they emphasize the book of nature and the laws of nature. But, unaccompanied as they are by the light of the lamp of Prophethood, they soon lose their way in darkness and are misguided. Blessed and secure is the faith which is acquired through the Messenger of God, for such faith is not confined to the extent that there is a need for the existence of God. Rather, hundreds of heavenly Signs carry it to the point that God does, indeed, exist. Therefore, the fact of the matter is that faith in the Prophets, peace be upon them, serves to fortify faith in God like pegs. Belief in God can only be sustained so long as one believes in the Messenger.
When faith in the Messenger is lost, faith in God also suffers a blow, and mere belief in the Oneness of God readily leads one astray. For this very reason, I said that faith based only upon natural instinct is accursed. In other words, someone whose faith is based only on the laws of nature and who relies exclusively upon nature and does not partake of the light of the Messenger deteriorates into accursed thinking. In short, whoever believes on the basis of nature alone and is estranged from the Messenger of God and the miracles of the Messenger, possesses faith akin to a wall of sand. He will be ruined tomorrow, if not today. Real faith is only that faith which is acquired after recognizing the Messenger of God. Such faith knows no decline, nor does it have an evil end.
Similarly, the belief of a person whose submission to the Messenger is superficial, who fails to recognize him and is unaware of his light, is also of little value. In the end, such a person is bound to become an apostate, as Musailimah Kadhdhab, ‘Abdullah ibn Abi Sarah, and ‘Ubaidullah ibn Jahsh turned apostates in the time of the Holy Prophet, may peace and blessings of Allah be upon him; Judas Iscariot and 500 other Christians turned apostates in the time of Hadrat ‘Isa, and Charagh Din of Jammu and ‘Abdul-Hakim Khan in this time of mine.