the banquet, we gathered at the home of one of the scholars, and the conversation turned to the Speech of Allah: Is it eternal without beginning, or do we affirm it only because He, exalted is He, has informed us that He speaks it?

We plunged into discussion over the issue. A group of us said, “The Creator’s Speech is eternal, without beginning.” Another group said, “His Speech is eternal, yet it is established only through His own disclosure and utterance.”

Early the next morning I went to Abū ʿAlī al-Thaqafī and told him what had transpired. He said, “Whoever denies that it has always existed is holding that it is created.”

Word of the matter spread through the town. Manṣūr al-Ṭūsī, accompanied by several others, went to Ibn Khuzaymah and informed him, and Manṣūr said, “Did I not tell the shaykh that these people follow the Kulabiyya school? This is exactly their doctrine.”

Ibn Khuzaymah then gathered his disciples and said, “Have I not forbidden you time and again from delving into speculative theology?” That day he said nothing further to them.

Al-Ḥākim said: ʿAbdullāh ibn Isḥāq al-Anmāṭī, the theologian, related to me: “Manṣūr al-Ṭūsī persisted with Abū Bakr Ibn Khuzaymah until he emboldened him against his own students. Meanwhile Abū Bakr ibn Isḥāq and Abū Bakr ibn Abī ʿUthmān would refute whatever Ibn Khuzaymah dictated, and they would attend the sessions of Abū ʿAlī al-Thaqafī, reading those refutations aloud in public, until the estrangement became deep-seated.”

I heard Abū Saʿīd ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Aḥmad, the Qurʾān-reciter, say that he heard Ibn Khuzaymah declare:

“The Qur’an is the Speech of Allah, His revelation and His sending down; it is uncreated. Whoever says that any portion of it is created, or says that the Qur’an is originated, is a Jahmi. Anyone who consults my books will see that the Kulabiyya—may Allah curse them—are liars in what they attribute to me, for it contradicts my foundational creed and religion. People of East and West know that no one has authored works on monotheism, divine decree, and the fundamentals of knowledge comparable to mine. It has become clear to me that these men—al-Thaqafī, al-Ṣibaghī, and Yaḥyā ibn Manṣūr—are liars who have fabricated against me while I am still alive. It is therefore forbidden for any seeker of knowledge to accept from them anything they claim in my name. Ibn Abī ʿUthmān is the most mendacious of them in my estimation and the one who attributes to me the most statements I have never uttered.”