We never sent any Messenger, but that he should be obeyed by the leave of God, [to the end of] the verse: the difference between a messenger and a prophet is that messengership entails the communication of laws, [as in] O Messenger, communicate [what has been revealed to you] [Q. 5:67]. As for prophethood, this is to inform of spiritual knowledge and realities that have to do with the differentiated aspects of [God's] attributes and acts. Prophethood is the exoteric aspect of spiritual sanctity (walāya), which is to be absorbed in the source of the union and the annihilation in the essence. The knowledge of these two is the knowledge of the affirmation of the unity of the essence and the effacement of the acts and attributes. Thus every messenger is a prophet and every prophet is a spiritual guardian (walī), but not every spiritual guardian is a prophet, nor is every prophet a messenger, even if the rank of spiritual guardianship is nobler than prophethood and prophethood [nobler] than messengership, as it is said:
'The station of prophethood is in an interstice (barzakh) slightly below that of the spiritual guardian and just above that of the messenger'.
Thus a messenger is only sent to be obeyed, since his law is the law of God by virtue of the communication [inherent therein]. He must therefore be obeyed, but is only obeyed by His permission, for the one who is veiled from him by a shortcoming in his preparedness, such as the primordial disbeliever and the true wretched one, or [veiled from him] by the rusting [of the heart] and the effacement of preparedness, such as the hypocrite is in reality not permitted to be obedient.
If, when they had wronged their souls, by preventing these from what is due to them, namely, their [unrealised] perfections that are fixed in them in potentiality, and by sullying their preparedness by orienting themselves towards the pursuit of sensory pleasures and transient goals, they had come to you, out of [their own] volition as entailed by their preparedness, and asked forgiveness from God, [and] asked God to conceal the attributes of their souls, which are the sources of those acts that veil what is in their preparedness by the light of His attributes, and the Messenger had asked forgiveness for them, by reinforcing them from the light of his attributes, which are the attributes of God, Might and Majestic, because of the interconnection that they have with him through genus and the place of will and love required by their nearness to him and their being admixed with him, they would have found God Relenting, cleansing and purifying of their preparedness with His light, for [His] acceptance of [their] repentance is the casting of the light of [His] attributes on them and the illumination of their inner aspects with the luminous configuration that protects them from erring in acts, given the remoteness of light from darkness, Merciful, effusing upon them the mercy of perfection that befits them in the way of certainty that comes through knowledge or entific existence or the Truth.